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Stay on top of Russia-Ukraine war 05-15-2024 developments on the ground with KyivPost fact-based news, exclusive video footage, photos and updated war maps.
A suspected gunman has been detained by police. Zelensky condemned the attack.
Slovakia's Prime Minister Robert Fico was battling life-threatening wounds Wednesday after officials said he was shot multiple times in an assassination attempt condemned by European leaders.
The Dennik N daily said its reporter in the central town of Handlova heard several shots fired and then saw security guards rushing to lift the premier off the ground and into a car.
The Ukrainian airline "Constanta", which provides cargo and passenger transportation for international humanitarian missions, has re-elected its supervisory board for a term of three years.
The Ukrainian airline "Constanta", which provides cargo and passenger transportation for international humanitarian missions, has re-elected its supervisory board for a term of three years. The decision was made at the shareholders' meeting on April 25, 2024.
Retired U.S. Army Major General and entrepreneur David L. Grange was elected as the Chairman of the Supervisory Board. Previously, this position was held by the founder and major shareholder of Constanta Airline, Roman Mileshko.
Currently facility employs 100 personnel relocated from the Kharkiv Philip Morris facility, 150 more are to be transferred by the end of the year
Philip Morris International, a leading tobacco industry company, launches a new facility in the Lviv region. USD 30 million was invested in the new facility construction.
It is known that the factory will comprise five production lines. The first line was launched in May, while the other four are to be commissioned by the end of the year. Thereafter, the facility`s capacity will reach 10 billion cigarettes per year covering the company`s demand to supply the Ukrainian market.
Reports circulating on social media claimed the missiles were being fired at Ukraine’s Kharkiv region in Russia’s latest offensive.
A Russian BM-21 Grad self-propelled rocket launcher could be seen firing a volley of rockets – presumably towards Ukraine – in the middle of a highway in the Belgorod region amidst numerous civilian cars, as seen in a video circulating on social media on Wednesday.
Some Ukrainian social media reports claimed the missiles were fired toward Ukraine’s Kharkiv region as part of the Russian military’s ongoing offensive, though Kyiv Post is unable to independently verify the claims.
Kyiv Post met with Azov fighters who participated in the unit’s formation, its first battles and its transformation into one of Ukraine’s fiercest fighting units.
Ukrainian forces have in recent weeks escalated aerial attacks on Russian border regions but have also been able to strike targets deep inside Russian territory.
Russia said Wednesday that a major airport near the city of Kazan, 1,000 kilometres (620 miles) from Ukraine, had been temporarily closed after the region was targeted by a Ukrainian attack drone.
Ukrainian forces have in recent weeks escalated aerial attacks on Russian border regions but have also been able to strike targets deep inside Russian territory.
The Kremlin said all the US-made long-range missiles were shot down, but the claim was debunked by big fires burning for hours at Belbek airfield and official warnings of cluster munitions.
Powerful explosions hit the main base of Russian military aviation in Crimea in the early hours of Wednesday and set fires burning for hours, in long-range strikes the Kremlin said were American ATACMS missiles fired by Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU) gunners.
Local social media followed by regional officials reported more than twenty explosions of varying intensity audible in the vicinity of Belbek airfield beginning shortly before 2 a.m. Moscow time and lasting about ten minutes.
The US House of Representatives Armed Services Committee has said that it wants to rationalize its future aircraft numbers by retiring some types that Kyiv would love to get its hands on.
The US Department of Defense (DoD) 2025 budget request, that was submitted to Congress at the end of March, included a plan for the Air Force to divest itself of around 250 airframes with projected savings of more than $2 billion.
In response the US House Armed Services Committee has produced its own plan by way of the 2025 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) which was released on Monday, May13. It says this plan is based on its own assessment of future warfighting requirements. While its plan for US military aviation directly opposes some of the Pentagon’s requests, it still has the potential to release aircraft which could provide Ukraine with the additional aircraft needed for its war with Russia.
Alyona Alyona, one of Ukraine’s singers in Saturday’s Eurovision Song Contest said organizers have fined the Ukrainian team for wearing “Free Azovstal Defenders” T-shirts.
Ukrainian singer Alyona Alyona said Kyiv’s delegation at the Eurovision Song Contest 2024 was fined for wearing T-shirts bearing the inscription “Free Azovstal Defenders,” which they wore to show solidarity with those members of Ukraine’s Armed Forces held as prisoners of war, particularly those from the Azov brigade who had defended Mariupol following the Russian invasion.
According to the singer, the competition rules said that any political inscriptions and brands were prohibited, the guards checked everyone’s clothes as they entered the venue and, if there was an inscription on it, asked to remove it or cover the inscriptions with black tape.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken visited Kyiv, where he praised Ukraine’s courage and urged continued reforms to “root out the scourge of corruption.”
During the second day of a visit to Kyiv, on Wednesday, May 15, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken announced the release of a $2 billion in military aid for Ukraine, aimed at bolstering Ukrainian forces against Russian attacks along the front lines.
This aid is part of a larger $61 billion package that Washington approved after months of congressional delays.
Blinken is on a surprise trip to Kyiv weeks after Washington approved a $61 billion package of aid for the country following months of delays in Congress.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken was trying to send a message of defiance and hope when he took to the stage of a Kyiv bar on Tuesday night for a guitar performance of "Rockin' in the Free World".
But some Ukrainians have reacted angrily, chastising Washington's top diplomat for an ill-judged jam session in the capital while Ukrainian troops are fighting in trenches, struggling to hold back a Russian advance amid a shortage of weapons.
As President Vladimir Putin’s cabinet reshuffle took shape and the war in Ukraine rages on, sacking Sergei Shoigu seemed momentous, but the removal of Patrushev has potentially greater significance.
“We cannot know further ways Of our word — how it’ll be drifted, —Compassion from above is giftedAs we are given sacred grace.” F.M. Tyutchev
On 11 May Kyiv Post published my opinion piece “A Personal Duel,” addressing how the French President, Emmanuel Macron was able to instruct the West in two and a half months that it need not fear Putin's nuclear blackmail and it had to stop placing absurd limitations on itself with red lines.
In an evening report, the General Staff stated that this move was made “to save the lives of military personnel and avoid unit losses.”
Ukrainian troops have withdrawn to “more advantageous positions” in the Kharkiv region the military stated Tuesday, May 14.
In an evening report, the General Staff stated that this move was made “to save the lives of military personnel and avoid unit losses.”
The Biden administration's transfer of long-range weaponry to Ukraine came with the stipulation that these arms not be used against targets within Russia.
A delegation of Ukrainian officials is now in Washington, seeking to persuade the US Congress to lift the ban on using American-supplied weapons for strikes on Russian soil, Politico reports.
The Biden administration's transfer of long-range weaponry to Ukraine came with the stipulation that these arms not be used against targets within Russia, even if those targets are launching attacks on Ukraine.
The world in focus, as seen by a Canadian leading global affairs analyst, writer and speaker, in his review of international media.
After months of slow Russian ground advances and technological leaps in countering American-provided arms, the Biden administration is increasingly concerned that President Vladimir V. Putin is gathering enough momentum to change the trajectory of the war, and perhaps reverse his once-bleak prospects. In recent days, Moscow’s troops have opened a new push near the country’s second-biggest city, Kharkiv, forcing Ukraine to divert its already thinned-out troops to defend an area that it took back from Russian forces in a stunning victory in the fall of 2022. Artillery and drones provided by the United States and NATO have been taken out by Russian electronic warfare techniques, which came to the battlefield late but have proven surprisingly effective. And a monthslong debate in Washington about whether to send Ukraine a $61 billion package of arms and ammunition created an opening that Russia has clearly exploited, even though Congress ultimately passed the legislation. In interviews, American officials express confidence that many of these Russian gains are reversible once the spigot of new arms is fully opened, most likely sometime in July, and President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine finds ways to bring more — and younger — troops to the front lines. But they are hesitant to offer predictions of where the battle lines may stand even a few months from now, or whether Mr. Zelensky will be able to mount his long-delayed counteroffensive next year, after one last spring fizzled. - NYT
President Salome Zurabishvili warned that Georgia's survival as a state is in danger after parliament approved a contentious "foreign agent" law despite weeks of popular protests and warnings from the West that the move endangers Georgia's Euro-Atlantic aspirations. Speaking at a news conference in Tbilisi with the visiting foreign ministers of Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, and Iceland on May 15, Zurabishvili reiterated she would veto the legislation approved a day earlier, as the government "did not listen to the voice of its people, nor to the advice of its friends, nor to anyone's warning, and went its own way…The issue of Georgia's survival is at stake today," she said. - RFE/RL
A Ukrainian intelligence source confirmed a successful attack on a fuel depot in Russia. Eyewitnesses say an oil depot was in flame. Russian officials deny any fire.
A fire broke out at a fuel depot near the city of Proletarsk, in Russia’s Rostov Oblast on this morning.
A Ukrainian intelligence source told Kyiv Post that the fire came as a result of a kamikaze drone attack organized by specialists from the military’s Main Intelligence Directorate (HUR).
Diplomatic sources say the Ukrainian president’s trip, which was also to include Portugal, was cancelled due to his country's complex situation in the face of the Russian offensive.
Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky has cancelled his visit to Madrid, scheduled for Friday (17 May), according to sources at the King’s Household, after announcing that he was to meet Felipe VI and then have lunch at the Royal Palace.
The Zarzuela Palace has not explained the reasons for suspending the visit, which was to be Zelenskky’s first bilateral visit to Spain and during which he was scheduled to meet with the Prime Minister, Pedro Sánchez, to sign an agreement on security matters.
Kremlin watchers and security experts consider Putin’s cabinet shake-up as signaling that Putin’s gaze has passed from Ukraine to a long, protracted war, against the West.
Russian leader Vladimir Putin, beginning his fifth term as the President of Russia, announced changes in key personnel responsible for the Russian security structure that some fear could indicate that a longer, larger war between Russia and the West may be on the horizon.
In a move that surprised Kremlin-watchers, Sergei Shoigu, the longtime Minister of Defense, was removed. Recently, several scandals had swirled around Shoigu, including a bribe of over $10 million that had allegedly been paid to one of his deputies.
Blinken's visit came just weeks after the US Congress finally approved a $61-billion financial aid package for Ukraine following months of political wrangling.
The United States will back Ukraine until its security is "guaranteed", US Secretary of State Antony Blinken vowed on a trip to Kyiv on Tuesday, after Russian forces claimed further advances in the northeastern Kharkiv region.
Blinken's visit came just weeks after the US Congress finally approved a $61-billion financial aid package for Ukraine following months of political wrangling, unlocking much-needed arms for the country's outgunned troops.
Recent Russian strikes have heavily damaged Ukraine's energy infrastructure, forcing the country to import electricity from neighbouring EU nations to meet demand.
Ukraine imposed emergency blackouts on Tuesday, May 15, after weeks of Russian attacks on power plants left the country struggling with the cold, according to state power operator Ukrenergo.
Recent Russian strikes have heavily damaged Ukraine's energy infrastructure, causing key facilities to fail and forcing the country to import electricity from neighboring EU nations to meet demand.
Putin arrives in Beijing on Thursday to meet his "dear friend" Xi Jinping, seeking to win greater support from China for his war effort in Ukraine and isolated economy.
Russian President Vladimir Putin hailed Beijing's "genuine desire" to help resolve the Ukraine crisis, in an interview with Chinese state media published Wednesday ahead of a two-day visit to the country.
Putin arrives in Beijing on Thursday to meet his "dear friend" Xi Jinping, seeking to win greater support from China for his war effort in Ukraine and isolated economy.
Obviously $100-150 billion annually to support Ukraine sound like big numbers. But these have to be set against the costs of not supporting Ukraine and the costs of a Russian victory.
Lots of figures are thrown around about the cost of supporting Ukraine in its defense against the Russian invasion. I have myself used a $100 billion a year price tag for keeping Ukraine in the war, and likely a $50 billion a year price tag to fund post-war reconstruction.
The Kiel Institute for the World Economy provides by far the best tracker of Western support for Ukraine. You can see it here.
Among the priorities listed by Russia’s new defense minister were arms procurement for frontline troops, modern technology development, staffing issues and resource optimizations.
Andrey Belousov, the defense minister newly nominated by Russian President Vladimir Putin with no prior military background, has shared a list of priorities he would work on once he assumes office.
At a plenary meeting of Russia’s Federation Council, Belousov said equipping frontline troops, developing new technology for the war, and ensuring timely payments and housing assistance for military personnel were all equally important priorities for him as the new defense minister.
In a newly intercepted conversation, a Russian commander threatens the soldier that the barrier troops will kill him and his comrades if they refuse to go on assault in the Kharkiv region.
In an intercepted phone call, published by Ukraine’s military intelligence (HUR) on Tuesday, May 14, a Russian commander threatens a soldier that barrier troops will kill him and his comrades if they refuse to go on assault in the Kharkiv region.
“I am commander! Your command has given the go-ahead,” he says, adding that all the retreat routes are cut off, with barrier units ready to kill them if they attempt to escape.
Latest from the Institute for the Study of War.
Key Takeaways from the ISW:
At least 20 injured in Russian assault on Kharkiv; Moscow’s new MoD chief calls for “minimal” casualties; Ukrenergo announces blackouts; UN Security Council worries about power supply for Ukrainians.
Kharkiv’s regional prosecutor’s office on Tuesday said that a barrage of airstrikes on the nation’s second-largest city wounded 20 people, including three children. The air assault was a continuation of a campaign in the country’s northeast outskirts that began last Friday and has reportedly seen the Russian occupation of about a half-dozen villages by the border.
About 6,000 residents have been evacuated from the area in the past few days. Air strikes on Monday had targeted the residential suburbs of Kharkiv, which sits only about 18 miles from the border.
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