UK seizes Russian shadow fleet tanker for the 1st time… Crimea’s fuel crisis spreads to Moscow… Zelenskyy comments on Putin’s intercepted documents… Evacuated Ukrainian children stranded in Italy due to court rulings…

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OUR LEAD STORY:

TBILISI, Georgia — Hundreds of viewers gasp in the thick air in excitement. For a moment, time itself seems to freeze in anticipation.

The scoreboard shows 14:14, this is a tie. Two sabers are raised for the final strike that will determine the winner.

Yuliia’s heart is pounding from the rapid movements, and the sound of rushing blood grows louder in her ears, but keeping composure is a must. She begins the attack, closing swiftly on her opponent, and lands a precise strike on her torso. The next moment, Yuliia is swept away by a hot wave of triumph. She has emerged victorious again, while her opponent, multiple Olympic champion and Russian Armed Forces major Sofya Velikaya, got knocked out of the 2025 Fencing World Championships.

The final strike that brought Ukraine’s Yuliia Bakastova victory over Russia’s Sofya Velikaya. July 2025. Video by the National Fencing Federation of Ukraine.

Yuliia Bakastova, a top Ukrainian fencer, finds herself in a whirlwind of emotion every time she walks onto the piste to compete against the world’s strongest athletes. She has to contain it all — excitement, anxiety, confidence, and now the pain of facing Russians at the upcoming Fencing World Championships.

As soon as Russia began its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, the sports arena also turned into a battlefield. According to the Angels of Sports project, led by the President of the Sports Committee of Ukraine Illia Shevliak, about 3,000 athletes are defending Ukraine in the Armed Forces (AFU). The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine has recently reported that over 650 athletes and coaches have been killed in ruthless Russian attacks.

While Russia and its close ally Belarus are trying to erase Ukrainian sports altogether, their teams still enter the world’s most prestigious competitions — including the Olympic Games — in a so-called “neutral” status, without their national flags and anthems. In the 2026 Winter Olympics hosted by Italy, a “neutral” Russian ski mountaineer, Nikita Filippov, even claimed a silver medal and received a wave of praise across Russian media.

On March 28, 2025, the World Kickboxing Federation was the first major sporting organization to let athletes from Russia and Belarus compete under their national symbols. This launched a wave of similar decisions across dozens of sports; the latest was taken on June 2 by the International Fencing Federation (FIE), which brought the competitors from Russia and Belarus back into the spotlight, starting from this year’s World Championships in Hong Kong.

While Russia is trying to portray big international sports as apolitical, they are not. Participation in top competitions brings Russia and its undemocratic counterparts visibility, respect, and fame and gradually normalizes their crimes by placing aggressors next to their victims on the winners’ pedestal.

For Yuliia, not only the sudden return of Russian athletes but even her whole career in fencing came unexpectedly. As a kid, she used to do wushu (Chinese martial arts) but had to abandon it when her family couldn’t afford to pay for training anymore. Fencing, on the other hand, was free. At 12, Yuliia first attended it and found a new passion.

“My Grandma took me there. She said she had a friend who could introduce me to the coach. She took me to the gym, I tried it, and I liked it,” Yullia recalled.

What began as an experiment is now Yuliia’s life. Her first coach, Oleksandr Obolenskyi, patiently showed her all the beauty of fencing and made her fall in love with the saber and the freedom it gave.

He was also the one who supported Yuliia when she came second-to-last in her first-ever competition. That day, totally unfazed by her result, she called her mother and only heard a demand to treat fencing more seriously. But the coach said something Yuliia still remembers: there is no victory without defeats.

After her first wins at local tournaments in Kyiv and then in nationwide competitions, Yuliia began working to become a professional athlete. Her teenage years were especially tough, as sports achievements were not an excuse to fall behind at school.

“My parents always had a rule that if I studied poorly, I would not go to training. Fencing was very important for me, so I always tried to study well. In fact, when I entered the sports boarding school, I finished it with a gold medal, too,” Yuliia shared.

At the age of 20, she was accepted to the national fencing team. Two years later, Yuliia got to represent Ukraine at the European Championships in Novi Sad, Serbia. Then, Ukrainian fencers came second after the athletes from Russia — the country that had already occupied Crimea and part of the Donbas.

In 2022, when Russian fencers were banned from major international sports events, the Ukrainian team had to leave their homes. As the first weeks of Russia’s full-scale invasion plunged the country into chaos, the coach Andrea Terenzio offered athletes refuge and training facilities in Italy. That looked like a dream but turned out to be a nightmare.

“When my mother wrote that it was a terrible night, I couldn’t help her... It was very difficult. When we read such news and came to the training, our coach could often see that we were doing terribly,” Yuliia said.

The athletes’ mental states became a major obstacle to their performance. To qualify for the Olympics, fencing teams have to undergo one of the hardest pre-selections. Only eight top teams in each fencing discipline can get the Olympic license. When Yuliia arrived in Italy, the Ukrainian saber team was in 19th place, facing one defeat after another.

Thanks to their perseverance and Terenzio’s trust in their abilities, the fencers came fourth in the 2023 World Championships in Milan. This is where Yuliia first faced — and defeated — “neutral” Russian fencers. In such duels, it becomes especially difficult for her to keep calm and focused.

“When you see a Russian fencer before you, you also see everything that is happening in your country, in the news… Well, there were many different thoughts.” She took her time to choose words carefully. “Sometimes, I just really want to tell them everything! But I still have to do everything according to the rules and show it publicly.”

This conflict between personal pain and sports ethics is familiar to all Ukrainian athletes who want to express support for their country publicly during the competitions. One of the most recent and illustrative cases is the story of the Ukrainian skeleton racer Vladyslav Heraskevych. He was disqualified from the 2026 Winter Olympics for wearing a “helmet of remembrance” with photos of Ukrainian athletes killed in Russian strikes. In solidarity, Ukrainian athletes and even the AFU supported him with the motto “Remembrance is not a violation.”

Indeed, the World Championships victory had a bitter taste, but it became the first step on Ukraine’s path to the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris. There, Ukrainian fencers emerged victorious, beating the South Korean team in the final round, and brought home the long-awaited gold medals.

“This is the moment I will remember for the rest of my life. This is what I was going for. All our team was going for it. This is when I fulfilled one of my dreams!” Yuliia shared.

Still, the grand victory couldn’t prepare her for facing the Russians in the 2025 World Championships in Georgia. This time, she competed against top-level athletes like Sofya Velikaya and Yana Yegoryan. Yuliia still remembers how a reporter approached them with hugs and smiles and then came up to the Ukrainian team to ask how things were going at home.

This is not uncommon, but after Russian fencers return to the piste with their national symbols, it can get much worse. Yuliia believes that Russia is returning to global sports arenas thanks to its influence on many world federations and all the money it has invested in them. In fencing, that was especially evident from 2008 to February 2022, when the FIE was chaired by Alisher Usmanov — one of Russia’s richest oligarchs. On November 30, 2024, he was re-elected as President but stepped down in just a few days so international sanctions against him would not affect the FIE.

“Everyone knows that Russia will not stop,” Yuliia warned. “It will always want power, want to be listened to, to be the best. Russia’s athletes are raised as if they were the best, the smartest, and so cool. But in fact, as it turned out, Russia is just a bubble.”

To pop this bubble, she doesn’t stop reminding viewers and international media reporters what exactly Russia is doing to her country, her nation, her home city, and hundreds of Ukrainian athletes who will never win another medal. Yuliia doesn’t give up because she has already seen one brave person changing the game.

At the 2023 World Championships in Milan, her teammate Olha Kharlan refused to shake hands with a Russian fencer, Anna Smirnova. This small action catalyzed change in the rules for everyone. Now, to consider the fight complete, fencers can just salute each other or touch blades instead of a formal handshake.

Yuliia will not cease to compete, score wins against Russia’s athletes, and expose its crimes to the global audience, as this is what years of fencing taught her to do.

“You need to be disciplined and believe in what you do. Sometimes you need time to achieve something. If you really put yourself into your work and do everything for it, the answer will always be there,” she said confidently.

Persistence can get you everything, be it another medal or bringing Russia down.

Interested in topics about sports? Take a deep dive into some of our related coverage.

War threatens Ukraine’s checkers champions

The dead Ukrainian athletes who can’t watch the Olympics

Ukraine’s horses under fire

Don’t push the horses

THE LATEST NEWS AT THIS HOUR:

By Oleksandra Poda

Good morning to readers; Kyiv remains in Ukrainian hands.

UK SEIZES RUSSIAN SHADOW FLEET TANKER FOR THE 1ST TIME: On June 14, the British Armed Forces seized the tanker Smyrtos. The vessel was unflagged but previously held the Cameroonian flag before it was removed from the Cameroonian registry and was transporting sanctioned Russian oil. The vessel was detained while attempting to cross the English Channel and was subsequently towed to the coast of England, where it will be held pending investigation.

Prime Minister Keir Starmer thanked the British armed forces, stating, “This successful operation delivers yet another blow to Russia and reminds those fueling Putin’s war in Ukraine that we will not let them hide.”

In March, Starmer announced that sanctioned vessels from Russia’s shadow fleet transiting British waters could be intercepted and detained by the British Armed Forces and law enforcement agencies. In May, Starmer also announced sanctions against 100 vessels that have transported sanctioned cargo.

CRIMEA’S FUEL CRISIS SPREADS TO MOSCOW: The Russian Republic of Tatarstan, which ranks second in the Russian Federation in terms of oil production, has imposed limits on purchases of fuel at gas stations. Major gas stations in Moscow and St. Petersburg have also begun to impose restrictions.

Previously, starting on May 31, gasoline in occupied Crimea was sold only with ration coupons, and in Sevastopol, a complete temporary suspension of fuel sales was announced.

Ukrainian strikes on oil refineries and terminals have halted or significantly reduced operations by about a quarter of Russia’s total refining capacity. The Russian government has banned gasoline exports until July.

ZELENSKYY COMMENTS ON PUTIN’S INTERCEPTED DOCUMENTS: On June 14, Zelenskyy revealed that internal Russian intelligence forecasts prepared specifically for Putin were obtained by Ukrainian intelligence. The documents were prepared ahead of the State Duma elections scheduled for September 18-20, 2026. According to them, support for the ruling United Russia party is declining, and dissatisfaction with Putin himself among Russians could reach 33%.

The growing discontent is attributed to inflation caused by military spending.

EVACUATED UKRAINIAN CHILDREN STRANDED IN ITALY DUE TO COURT RULINGS: On June 13, CNN published an in-depth investigation into how the humanitarian evacuation of Ukrainian children turned into a legal dispute between Kyiv and the Italian judicial system. In the summer of 2022, 25 orphans from an orphanage in Sumy were evacuated to Naples by a charity that reached out to the facility’s director. However, upon arrival in Italy, their legal guardians were not recognized by Italy, and they were granted refugee status as unaccompanied minors and were assigned new Italian guardians.

At the same time, Italy has a law dating back to the migration crisis that prohibits the removal of a child refugee without a court order, except in “exceptional circumstances.” Many foster families are opposing sending the children back to Ukraine.

PIGEONS OF WAR

Two doves show that no matter how dark and frightening the night may be, love always triumphs.

Stay safe out there.

Best,
Oleksandra

The EU will open the first cluster of negotiations for Ukraine to join the union, — a milestone that’s been frozen for two years due to Hungary’s veto. The talks are set to start in Luxembourg on June 15, beginning the formal process of aligning Ukrainian legislation with EU standards.

Read more

Russia pumps less and less oil… Ukraine is cutting off Crimea… U.S. Senate pushes for $750 million for Ukraine… Serbia gives away passports to Russians.

In early September 2022, the iron pipe propping up the door was kicked aside, hitting the floor with a loud clang.

For the civilian prisoners in Kherson, this sound meant one thing: turn to the wall. A guard entered the cell, and Oleksii Patalakh heard crying. He was surprised; usually, none of the newcomers cried. The cell door swung open, and the Russian guard said. “Listen to me: make sure nobody messes with the little one.”

In the dim light of the cell, Oleksii saw a fair-haired boy standing before him.

Read more

Russia’s largest oil refineries attacked… Logistics in Crimea disrupted… EU to open negotiations with Ukraine in June.

OUR LEAD STORY:

KYIV, Ukraine — When Yurii Anikeiev was a child, he spent hours in his family library, curiously flipping through a book about world champions of board games in his hometown, Kivsharivka, in the Kharkiv region. As a ten-year-old, he would head to his local checkers club and be the only one who stayed behind, even when it emptied out.

At that time he would always wonder how it felt to be etched in the pages of history as a champion. 33 years later, he found out, leading the Ukrainian team to a silver medal at the World Championship in international checkers this May.

Ukraine has maintained some of the top positions in international competitions for games such as chess and checkers since gaining independence in the 1990s. Affordable to play and access, classic board games became a popular leisure-time activity among Ukrainians through centuries, raising generations of world champions in mind sports.

However, the Russian war threatens to unravel what took decades to build.

During Russia’s full-scale invasion, Ukraine felt a devastating blow on its intellectual sports community. According to official figures from Ukraine’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Ministry of Youth and Sports, more than 500 Ukrainian athletes and coaches have been killed by the Russian military. Among them were at least 21 chess players. Internal estimates within the chess community suggest that the total number of losses, including junior players, may be as high as 40-50.

Now, some of Ukraine’s top players have moved abroad because of the war and lack of governmental funding, while others, like Yurii himself, are serving in the armed forces. Without extra support, the country risks losing not only its long-established championship positions but also another platform for self-representation and international cooperation.

In January 2026, Yurii Anikeiev was mobilized to fight in the Ukrainian armed forces. Despite this, he remains involved in the sport, participating in championships, as Ukrainian law does not prohibit it for servicemen. Attending tournaments does, however, require a multi-stage bureaucratic process to obtain all the necessary permissions.

Yurii’s first invitation to take his checkers game international came in 2009, when he was invited by the Chinese Checkers Federation to Shanghai at the age of 26. Compared to other board games, checkers developed later in China, when The General Administration of Culture and Sports of China has integrated international draughts into the official list of disciplines for the first time. So they wanted to learn from the experience of skilled players from Ukraine and other post-Soviet countries.

Before this trip, Yurii had already achieved a series of significant victories, starting with wins in local tournaments in 1993. That was a time when Ukrainian chess and checkers were going through a difficult post-Soviet economic crisis as state funding was abolished, sports organizations declined, and leading coaches and athletes either moved abroad in large numbers or changed their profession. However, the remaining Soviet-era infrastructure and coaching expertise still allowed Ukrainian players to quickly enter the global intellectual community.

Checkers may have arrived in present-day Ukraine as early as the third and fourth centuries, as suggested by gaming pieces unearthed in Slavic graves in the Kyiv region. In the days of Kyivan Rus, the medieval state that flourished in present-day Ukraine, chess was a favored pastime of the nobility. Centuries later, under Soviet rule, Ukraine became one of the USSR’s leading hubs for chess and checkers.

“Kyiv and Kharkiv were the main hubs in checkers,” Yurii recalled.

These games united people of all ages, creating a form of intellectual recreation that fit neatly into the USSR’s effort to regulate every sphere of life, even leisure. Children actively participated in school tournaments, while seniors played checkers in the yard.

Even today, if one takes a stroll in central Kyiv, they could see old men with chessboards in the park, playing for hours on end.

After Ukraine gained independence, it continued to achieve victories in international board game tournaments, producing champions such as Ruslan Ponomariov, who became the 16th World Chess Champion in 2002, or Mariia Muzychuk, the World Checkers Champion in 2015. In individual adult World Championships, representatives of Ukraine have taken winning positions at least 10 times.

“I remember there were gifts [at the local tournaments] — little toy soldiers or similar toys. At that time, even small presents mattered a lot to children,” he recalled about his first success.

Yurii went on to place sixth and fulfill the requirements for the title of Master of Sport at the Ukrainian Men’s Championship, even though he was only 13 years old at the time. But the most important victories for Yurii were in the world championships on both the 64 and 100-square boards — the two most popular variants of the board game differ in board size, the number of pieces, and the rules. When he was just 16, Yurii had reached what many consider the absolute peak of achievement for any checkers player.

This May, the Ukrainian men’s national team, of which Yurii was a member, became the first to win a silver medal at the World Championship in France. It was a historic breakthrough for the country in the field of checkers, as previously Ukraine had only achieved fourth place at such tournaments in 1992 and 2000.

“I was very pleased with the result. Of course, it was not the first medal, but success in a team tournament, and especially under such circumstances, added even more joy to the successful performance,” Yurii said.

Yurii believes his skills with checkers even help him on the battlefield, where he serves in the 225th Separate Assault Regiment as a soldier. Checkers trains the mind to calculate cascading effects, chains of consequences triggered by a single move, under strict time pressure. In close combat or under shelling, this ability to quickly weigh risks and suppress panic.

“Everything that exists in sport also exists in the army,” Yurii said. “In sport, you impose limits on yourself — you say: I can’t do this. You get used to that discipline. Here [in the army], the restrictions are imposed on you from the outside, so in a way it feels easier to adjust,” Yurii said.

Interested in topics about the Ukrainian sports culture?

Don’t push the horses

The Ukrainian roots of Mixed Martial Arts’ most feared Russian fighters

The dead Ukrainian athletes who can’t watch the Olympics

Ukraine has a large number of veterans from the war and will inevitably face the massive challenge of integrating millions of them back into civilian society.

The Arsenal, the sister publication of The Counteroffensive, conducted an interview with U.S. Senator Ruben Gallego at the Black Sea Security Forum about veterans and how they can be supported now and after the war.

THE LATEST NEWS AT THIS HOUR:

By Oleksandra Khelemendyk

Good morning to readers; Kyiv remains in Ukrainian hands.

RUSSIA’S LARGEST OIL REFINERIES ATTACKED: Satellite images provided by Radio Free Europe show that at least four or five fuel tanks at Grushovaya, Russia’s largest petroleum storage facility in the Caucasus, have been destroyed by a Ukrainian strike on June 8. This follows another attack on the same site in May. In total, 10-15 tanks have been damaged.

On Wednesday, President Zelenskyy also confirmed a strike of FP-5 Flamingo missiles on the Kuibyshev oil refinery in the Samara region. This is one of the key oil facilities in Russia located more than 900 km away from the frontline in Ukraine. Zelenskyy also announced that the attack hit a military plant which produces parts for drones and missiles used by Russia.

LOGISTICS IN CRIMEA DISRUPTED: The Chongar bridge, which connects occupied Crimea to the Kherson region, is damaged, according to Andrii Kovalenko, the head of the state Centre for Countering Disinformation. The Russian army used it to supply machinery and weapons to the frontline.

This comes as Russia’s maritime navigation capacity is limited by Ukrainian attacks. The Armed Forces of Ukraine carried out a strike on the Russian shadow fleet tanker in the Black Sea and on the vessel Lady Augusta during the temporary power-cut in Mariupol port.

EU TO OPEN NEGOTIATIONS WITH UKRAINE IN JUNE: In the joint statement after a meeting in Tallinn on June 9, the Nordic-Baltic Eight countries supported opening all 6 negotiating clusters on Ukraine’s way to the EU. Each cluster includes the EU laws and regulations that Ukraine needs to implement before accession.

The first of them, with legislation on fundamental rights, effective state services and democratic institutions, is expected to open on June 15.

Meanwhile, the EU is preparing a new 21st sanctions package against Russia, which includes freezing the assets of about 90 banks, freezing the oil price cap for Russia, new sanctions against Russia’s companies and its shadow fleet, and a visa ban for current and former Russian soldiers.

POLAND WANTS A PART IN UKRAINE PEACE TALKS: Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said that his country, one of Ukraine’s key allies and biggest spenders on defense ‌in ⁠NATO, should take part in any potential peace negotiations for Ukraine.

This came after the June 7 meeting in London, where President Zelenskyy, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, and French President Emmanuel Macron discussed the need to strengthen Ukraine’s air defenses and deep-strike capabilities. In a joint statement, they supported the idea of direct ​talks between Ukraine ​and Russia, ⁠with the U.S. and Europe involved.

DOG OF WAR:

Today’s dog of war, Kylie, ran up to greet Kateryna while her pet parents were ordering coffee.

Stay safe out there.

Best,
Anastasiia

Editor’s Note:

This story is unusual for our publication; it doesn’t center on a single human story.

Instead, it focuses on developments on the battlefield and the war’s evolving dynamics. We believe this is an important story to tell because, amid the many stories we cover, it can be easy to lose sight of the fact that the war remains the defining reality in Ukraine. Today’s piece is a reminder of that reality and why it matters.

Subscribe to our publication to read more stories from Ukraine.

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Tim Mak held a livestream with George Barros, Director of Innovation and Open Source Tradecraft at the Institute for the Study of War (ISW), about the latest on the Russian economy and battlefield situation in Ukraine.

OUR LEAD STORY:

Despite the record number of drones launched against Ukrainian cities and ground attacks on the frontline, May 2026 might be the worst month for Russia since the Ukrainian counteroffensive of autumn 2023. We consulted open-source data aggregators and asked experts about strategic updates on the war in Ukraine so you can know what is happening on the battlefield.

A frontline update: month 51 of the full-scale invasion

On the battlefield, Ukraine is regaining tactical advantage at certain sections of the frontline. According to the analytical group DeepState, the number of Russian ground attacks jumped by 37.5 percent compared to April and reached a record-breaking 7,000, but Russia only captured 14 sq. km of Ukrainian territory. For the first time since October 2023, it endured a negative net gain.

One of Russia’s most problematic objectives is the Donetsk region. After the full occupation of Pokrovsk and Myrnohrad, Russian troops are attempting to infiltrate into Kostiantynivka, a vital transport hub and a fortified area. They are razing the city to make it extremely difficult to defend. The enemy also pressures Ukrainian armed forces next to the village of Rodynske in an attempt to approach Dobropillia, another important transport hub. The situation remains difficult in the direction of Sloviansk, about 40 miles to the north, where the Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU) risk being surrounded.

In the Kharkiv region, the AFU liberated the village of Odradne and assaulted the enemy positions near Vovchansk, 45 miles away from Kharkiv. However, Russia is accumulating its troops near Vovchansk for a summer offensive and is trying to infiltrate the city of Kupyansk.

In the Zaporizhzhia region, the AFU reclaimed control over territories next to the cities of Stepnohirsk, Orikhiv, and Hulyaipole.

DeepState also reported Ukrainian advances near the Zaporizhzhia, Dnipro, and Donetsk regions’ administrative borders, where Russia has lost about 46 sq. km. of land.

On Thursday’s livestream with The Counteroffensive, Director of Innovation and Open Source Tradecraft at the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) George Barros said that the AFU owe their tactical initiative in this direction to “better campaign planning, better preparation, better intelligence, and then to better innovation and development of… weapons that are allowing the Ukrainians to affect very important Russian targets that were previously in a safe zone.”

One of Ukraine’s recent technological advancements is the domestically made guided aerial bomb Vyrivniuvach (Ukrainian for “leveller”), which is significantly cheaper than American-made analogues.

Less destructive than Russia’s bombs that carry up to 3 metric tons of explosives, it can give Ukrainian forces tactical parity on the frontline. With its 250-kg warhead, it can strike objects 60 to 80 km away from its airborne deployment, or up to 40 km into Russia’s territory past its air defense, military expert Viktor Kevliuk of the Ukrainian security think tank Center for Defence Strategies (CDS) said. Still, he noted that no bomb is effective without proper carriers.

“It depends on whether this bomb is integrated into the weapon control system of the planes provided by our allies,” he told The Counteroffensive. “I hope that all our F-16s, all our Mirages can drop this bomb, or our golden hands will create the necessary integration.”

Another distinct feature of Ukraine’s warfare is the effective use of its military personnel. On June 4, President Zelenskyy wrote an open letter to Putin, in which he pointed out the human dimension of Russia’s losses.

“I received a report on the losses of your army in May. Again, this is more than 30,000 killed and severely injured Russians… We know that 63 percent of your frontline casualties are the dead and 37 percent are the injured,” he said and claimed that Ukraine is losing one soldier for every 5 or 6 Russian troops.

If there is any way to maintain the tactical success Ukraine gained on the battlefield, it should be by using our best talents: building alliances, valuing people, and fostering innovative approaches to the war.

Russia’s war economy: pompous but fragile

For Russia’s ability to wage this war and its overall economy, the past month showed a sharp contrast between a public image of riches and an actual financial state.

Today the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum is coming to an end. In a conversation with The Counteroffensive, Serhii Fursa, deputy director at Kyiv-based investment company Dragon Capital, called it purely demonstrative.

“This forum is the answer to all these publications and conversations [claiming] that everything is bad,” he said. “They are trying to make it as bright and expensive as possible to convince themselves and everyone around that everything is fine.”

However, the backdrop of this show is murky, with Ukrainian drones attending the opening ceremony uninvited and a looming economic recession. On June 1, Bloomberg reported that senior Russian officials are concerned about whether Russia can afford its war on Ukraine any longer without additional funding. In the first quarter of 2026, its budget deficit already exceeded the projected annual 3.79 trillion rubles ($51.35 billion) by 55 percent, reaching 5.88 trillion ($79.4 billion).

According to Serhii Fursa, Russia’s economy is currently stagnating.

“The real income of the population is falling,” he explained. “On the other hand, there are constant reports that expensive stores are being closed, cheap ones are being opened, general retail is being reduced, and so on.”

Fursa noted that Russia will not collapse overnight, but the situation is critical because the state budget remains the primary source for financing the war. In 2022-2025, Russia mostly covered the costs from “the barrel” of the National Welfare Fund, filled by excessive revenues from oil and gas sales over the past two decades. Before the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, it held about $113.5 billion in liquid assets (foreign currency and gold). By 2026, the Fund shrinked to $52.9 billion, so further attempts to close the budget gap at its cost will effectively drain it.

The war that the U.S. and Israel are fighting in the Middle East was of unexpected help to Russia, but not quite sustainably. Due to supply disruptions oil prices climbed as high as $120 per barrel, so Russia’s oil revenues in the short term also increased. However, they must remain at that level for a whole year before Russia’s economic situation notably improves.

Such a scenario seems unlikely, as the U.S. and Iran are clearly disadvantaged by the prolonged war and have expressed interest in ending it sooner. A more feasible solution for Russia, according to Serhii Fursa, lies in printing more money; however, this step can weaken the ruble and push prices on the internal market even higher.

“If they face a choice to either stop the war or fight, they can print money for a while. This will undermine the economic situation even more, but this is a decision that Putin can make.”

He added that the limited printing of money, as covertly as possible, is already underway, along with new inflation risks.

Regardless of the path Russia chooses, its war against Ukraine is getting increasingly costly and changing the way Russians live. In the long term, if it becomes practically impossible for Russia to evade sanctions and Ukraine’s strikes on oil infrastructure continue, the crisis can eventually push the war towards the end.

Second front in Europe?

At the end of April, ISW analysts warned about Russia’s possible plans to invade one of the Baltic states. According to their report, the Security Council of Russia has accused Lithuania of militarization and creating “a hotbed of tension” near Kaliningrad Oblast. A month later, Russia threatened to take the Baltic states to the International Court of Justice for “oppression of Russians.”

Amid Russia’s increasingly bold actions, NATO states are testing their military capabilities. From May 9 to 13, more than 18,000 soldiers from 13 countries, including Ukraine, participated in a Swedish-led military exercise on the island of Gotland, training to repel, among other things, a head-on Russian attack. On May 18, Russia and Belarus began their own joint nuclear drills, and the Kremlin’s spokesperson Dmitry Peskov called it a signal to Europe and NATO.

On May 25-26, after a sequence of accidental Ukrainian drone incursions into the airspace of the Baltics, Lithuania tested its drone interception systems. Three days later, a Russian drone hit an apartment building and injured two people in the city of Galati, Romania. Bucharest aims to strengthen its air defense with aircraft and radars from France and other NATO members.

ISW’s Barros believes that aiding Ukraine and bolstering NATO’s capabilities should be parallel, as the possibility of an escalation in the eastern NATO states is closely linked to the situation in Ukraine.

“What happens when Putin essentially threatens NATO and says, ‘Hey, NATO is not prepared to deal with 600 drones entering the airspace in one night. So we can cause a crisis in the Baltic states and hit you with a bunch of drones, or you can basically just give up and give us Ukraine and let us just finish our war here?’” he asked, and warned that the Allies have to be ready for a major military threat from Russia.

Ukraine, alongside the Baltics, also considers a potential threat from Belarus similar to that of the invasion of 2022. At the end of May, President Zelenskyy convened his Staff to discuss possible offensive scenarios from the north. He claimed that at least five of them have been considered, and Ukraine is getting ready to defend itself in the Kyiv and Chernihiv regions.

Viktor Kevliuk of CDS does not exclude the possibility of invasion but deems it rather low. He points out that Ukrainian intelligence, which closely monitors the situation, did not report any strike units formed on the border. Also, the Belarusian Armed Forces are too small to carry out a major offensive against Ukraine.

What concerns him more are the close economic, political, and military ties between Belarus and Russia.

“We must understand that the self-proclaimed Belarusian dictator and his country are deeply integrated into the Russian Federation, that’s called Union State. Belarus avoids open participation in hostilities, but it provided its territory, airspace, and intelligence units, which conduct radio-technical and radio-electronic intelligence against us,” he warned. “Repair units are active, too, and Belarus has given a lot of ammunition from its reserves to the Russians.”

As low as it seems, Russia uses the probability of an invasion for its hybrid warfare. Amid its heavy losses in May, it attempts to intimidate Ukrainians in the border regions and divert military forces from the frontline.

Despite its numerical superiority, Russia sees Ukrainian soldiers as a major threat. No wonder, as they can give the invaders many more hellish months.

Interested to know what’s going on in Ukraine? I recommend reading these stories about the latest updates:

NEWSFLASH: Zelenskyy, in first Putin letter, says ceasefire can’t wait for Trump

Russian drone injures two in NATO member Romania

NEWSFLASH: Russia’s scariest attack yet

NEWS OF THE DAY

By Oleksandra Poda

Good morning to readers; Kyiv remains in Ukrainian hands.

PUTIN SEES NO POINT IN MEETING WITH ZELENSKYY: On June 5, at the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum (SPIEF), Putin rejected Zelenskyy’s proposal for an in person meeting. “So far, I see no point,” the Russian leader said, calling Zelenskyy’s open letter rude. This came after Zelenskyy sent a letter, published on Thursday, to Putin proposing a face-to-face meeting.

Zelenskyy responded in an evening address: “Unfortunately, the Russian side is once again choosing war again.” Trump said in Washington that personal talks between Zelenskyy and Putin would be great.

UKRAINIAN NAVAL DRONE EXPLODES IN ROMANIAN PORT: A Ukrainian naval drone exploded in the port of Constanta, Romania, on June 5. This is the second time in a week that a Ukrainian drone has exploded in Romania, as Ukraine blamed Russian electronic warfare for throwing the drones off course. It reached out to Romania in advance to warn them, after which Romania evacuated the area. The explosion caused no casualties.

The President of the European Commission called the incident “a direct consequence of Russia’s war against Ukraine.”

PUTIN LIES ABOUT SUCCESS ON THE FRONT, ISW SAYS: On June 5, Putin claimed that Russian troops were advancing along the entire front line and had occupied 85 percent of Donetsk region and 80 percent of Zaporizhzhia region, and had reached drone parity with Ukraine. The Institute for the Study of War investigated each of these claims, noting that they were false.

In April and May 2026, Ukrainian forces liberated more territory than Russia captured, underscoring Russia’s declining combat performance and Ukraine’s success in halting Russia’s spring-summer offensive.

DOG OF WAR

Oleksandra lives on an island in Kyiv, where corgis live in literally every corner of the island. This happy pup ran up to meet her in one of the shops in the area.

Stay safe out there.

Best,
Oleksandra.

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In his first ever letter to Putin since the full-scale invasion, Zelenskyy is asking for an end to the war and to meet face to face with the Russian president.

The letter, published Thursday evening Ukraine time, calls out the United States’ lack of attention to the conflict.

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KYIV, Ukraine — I have never been to a place like this. A light drizzle and occasional gusts of wind get right to my bones in my thin jacket, but all I can think of is, “How do I approach people here?”

I take another minute to swallow a salty clot in my throat before pushing the door open — and my shoulders immediately relax. Warm air smells like freshly baked garlic bread and roast potatoes, while the faint clink of crockery and casual, friendly chit-chat in the next room make me feel like I came home for a family dinner.

“Good morning! My name is Mariia, and I’ll show you around today.”

A friendly woman, slightly older than me, hands me a set of workwear and waits patiently as I struggle with the Velcro fasteners on the robe.

When we step into the kitchen, the hustle overwhelms me, but in a minute or two, I notice a rhythm in the chaos. Some are shaping dumplings and others are frying potatoes to feed those in need, while Mariia explains operations as a man is walking past me with boxes of baked goods ready for delivery. With their sparse but fluid movements, everyone looks in their element, so it is impossible to tell that they have been diagnosed with mental disabilities.

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KYIV, Ukraine — Until the age of 37, Iryna did not know her true origin. As a child growing up in Nova Karakuba, a village in the Donetsk region of southeastern Ukraine, she simply noticed that her grandparents spoke differently.

She recalls asking when she was seven or eight years old, “Grandma, how do you say bread?” “Psuny,” she replied. “And how do you say water?” “Nero.” The words she wrote down on a piece of paper back then remained etched in her memory forever.

“All my life I considered myself Greek,” Iryna says, “until the war broke out and my native village was occupied. My grandparents passed away, and I began to question who I really am. And the truth is: I am Rumey.”

Crimea has been inhabited by Greeks since ancient times — it was colonized by Greek settlers back in the 7th century BC. The cities they built there — Chersonesus, Panticapaeum, Theodosia — were not provincial outposts but thriving centers of trade, philosophy and art, deeply woven into the fabric of the Hellenic world. Crimea is, in every sense, the cradle of ancient Greek culture on Ukrainian soil.

Greeks continued to live on the peninsula until the Russian Empire deported them in 1778, during the Russo-Turkish War, to the territory of the modern Donetsk region. This deportation gave rise to the North Azovian Greeks—a unique community composed of two distinct sub-ethnic groups: the Turkic-speaking Urums and the Hellenic-speaking Rumeys.

The suffering of the North Azovian Greeks deepened under Soviet rule, enduring the brutal repressions of 1937-1938, mass executions, and systematic attempts to erase their identity to forge “Soviet people.”

Today Russia is trying to spread its narratives through loyal Greek media and organizations to strengthen its global influence. After all, any fake news launched through local European outlets is perceived by Europeans with much greater trust than a direct broadcast from Moscow.

Iryna fondly remembers her childhood in Nova Karakuba, in the Donetsk region. From 1945 to 2024, the village was called Krasna Polyana — a name that was designated by Soviet authorities. However, in the fall of 2024, the Verkhovna Rada, as part of decommunization, renamed the village back to the original name, which was once given to it by Greek settlers. As a young girl, she did Greek dancing and even traveled to Mariupol for competitions. She recalls that all the children wore t-shirts adorned with Greek flags. In her village, everyone was simply referred to as “Greeks” — a blanket term, as she would later discover. Yet they did not hail from mainland Greece, nor did they have any direct connection to it. They came from Crimea.

Back in 1920, the newly formed USSR faced the immense challenge of managing its ethnic diversity. To address this, the Bolsheviks launched a program designed to teach indigenous peoples their national languages and writing systems — while also exerting a nationalistic influence on education, culture, public administration, the socio-economic sphere, and public life.

What could possibly be wrong with fostering national identities? “Korenizatsiya,” translated in Western sources as “nativization,” indicates that the Soviet regime wanted to create the illusion that Bolshevism was not imposed from above, but was fundamentally indigenous. The population needed to be made literate only to the exact culture and language required to inject them with the ideas of socialism.

Iryna’s grandmother worked as a milkmaid all her life, and her grandfather as a tractor driver. They often recalled how in their childhood they survived the Holodomor of 1932-1933 and later lived through World War II; because of this, they never shied away from hard work, deeply loving and fiercely cultivating their land. They spoke Rumey all their lives and died at the age of 89, before the full-scale invasion began.

On December 15, 1937, Communist Party understood that independence in the national republics was growing and that this movement could collapse the Soviet Union and cause the USSR to lose control over its resources. That’s why large-scale campaigns were launched against “bourgeois nationalism.” Then, “all Greeks suspected of espionage, sabotage, insurgency and nationalist anti-Soviet work” were to be arrested.

In total, more than 20,000 people were persecuted during the operation, the largest repressions of Greeks in the Donetsk Azov region. The number of people killed and tortured in this region exceeded 5,000. Since then, being Greek meant being killed or tortured.

Iryna remembers her mother never admitted to anyone that she was Greek: “No, no, no, God forbid you tell someone that you are Greek. God forbid,” she said.

Consequently, even though the Urum and Rumaiic languages were entirely different in both grammar and origin, they were artificially merged into a single, officially recognized language. It had to look nothing like the language spoken in Greece, as Greece was viewed as a hostile, monarchical country, and the Bolsheviks naturally refused to adopt that model. Instead, all Greeks were offered a simplified version of modern Greek, which was completely alien to Rumaiic.

The USSR wanted to show Greece that ethnic Greeks lived well in the Soviet Union. The idea was that if the North Azovian Greeks spoke the official language of Greece but praised Stalin and communism, their newspapers, books, and radio broadcasts could be exported back to Greece as propaganda. Yet, the older generation still managed to keep the Rumeika language alive.

Growing up in the late 90s and early 2000s, little Iryna learned to ride a horse at the age of 9. She says that she would stand on a bench, throw a blanket on the horse instead of a saddle, climb on it, and ride. She was a brave young girl — she also learned to swim, drive a car, and herd cows. By 10, she supported her parents: she carried straw, whitewashed the house, and planted trees. Iryna felt her identity precisely through her grandparents.

A child’s curiosity for knowledge always guided her. “Why do my grandparents speak ancient Greek? Why, if they are Greek, do their surnames have different endings than Greek? And why does my mother speak Russian?”

Once, Iryna was leafing through the Bible when her mother — who was not religious — said, “You don’t need to read it, there’s nothing interesting there.” Later, Iryna would understand that her mother’s inhibition was a product of the Soviet regime, which had suppressed all forms of faith and religion.

Life in Nova Karakuba shaped her as a person; the traditions she learned left an indelible mark on her warmest memories. It was a friendly village, where everyone celebrated all the holidays together. Anyone from your village is your neighbor, she says, and it doesn’t matter if you live 2 kilometers from each other. The whole village went to the funerals, even if you didn’t know the family personally.

The little boys in the village were very proud of being Greeks. They often spoke Rumey and felt quite special, especially when no one else could understand them. Iryna recalls Modern Greek being added to the school curriculum, but it was completely different from the language her grandparents spoke at home.

In 2014, Russia annexed the territories of the Donetsk region — an area where the Greeks lived compactly.

When Iryna’s classmates became adults, they came from all over the world every year to celebrate the anniversary of their graduation from school. That was until 2014, when Russia interrupted this tradition.

Iryna began to feel Russian influence creep into her life as early as her youth. Many adults would travel to Russia for seasonal work because it offered seemingly better economic opportunities. When they returned, their mindset had shifted; they no longer wanted to associate themselves with Ukraine. Today, Iryna understands that this was a deliberate cultivation of an inferiority complex.

She recalls that since the war began in 2014, one of her classmates supported Ukraine while another sided with Russia. Today, one lives under occupation in the so-called Donetsk People’s Republic (”DNR,” the Moscow-backed puppet entity illegally established by Russian-controlled militants), while the other serves in the Ukrainian State Emergency Service. They no longer see or speak to each other.

When Iryna traveled to Greece in 2024 with her children and mother to visit her aunt — who had obtained citizenship in the 1990s and spent a good half of her life there — she felt no cultural connection to the nation. “For the New Year, our boys back home would ‘carry the plow’ (nosyty pluzhok) — a unique North Azovian Rumaiic ritual that doesn’t exist among mainland Greeks.”

“We also celebrate Panair—a festival where people from the entire district and region gather for mass communal celebrations. That does not even exist in mainland Greece.” North Azovian Greeks cook traditional Crimean Greek dishes like shumush — a savory pumpkin and meat pie — and chebureki with various fillings. A key highlight of the festival is the kuresh wrestling matches, where the ultimate prize for the winner is a live ram. This vibrant tradition reflects a unique Greek culture that cannot be found anywhere else in the world.

Despite this rich heritage, the Rumey and Urum peoples do not hold the official status of indigenous peoples in Ukraine; instead, they are legally classified as a national minority. While the North Azovian Greeks in Ukraine fight for the right to preserve their culture at the state level, within Russia itself, the theme of indigenous rights is cynically weaponized as a geopolitical tool.

Though there are 160 distinct ethnic groups in Russia, only 40 are officially recognized as “small-numbered indigenous peoples.” Any identified group within the Russian Federation must be under 50,000 people; If an ethnic group is larger (such as the Tatars, Yakuts, Chechens, or Bashkirs), they are denied corresponding benefits — such as protection for their traditional homes, trades (fishing, reindeer herding, hunting), crafts, studying native languages at schools, and conducting mass media in native languages. Furthermore, they must reside in the traditional territories of their ancestors and strictly maintain a “traditional lifestyle.”

Times have changed — especially since the 2022 full-scale invasion — but Russia’s methods remain the same: it continues to fight and destroy indigenous peoples on their own territory. To crush any resistance, the Russian authorities now lock up indigenous activists using “terrorism” charges, which can mean up to 20 years in prison. In December 2025, security forces launched a massive wave of raids, targeting activists from Yakutia and Altai to St. Petersburg. Two prominent female human rights defenders were thrown into pretrial detention, and just recently, in May 2026, Moscow courts extended their arrests until at least mid-June.

To reduce the population of indigenous peoples, Russian authorities deliberately recruit them for the war against Ukraine. The regions where these ethnic groups live are mostly poor, with high unemployment and low wages. As a result, people are forced to sign military contracts just to survive.

Today, Iryna refuses to go back and see what has become of her native village; “It would hurt too much because it’s no longer the same. It is no longer about the Rumaiic people, no longer about the Greeks, unfortunately.”

She cannot return home. Only memories remain. The traditions, the heritage — everything is gone, violently stripped away.

“You begin to search for some kind of identity. To dig deep inside yourself. Who am I? What am I? I don’t want to be Russian. I feel ashamed that I have those roots. But there is nothing I can do about it.”

Yet finally, after so many years of intergenerational trauma, repression, and shame passed down through the bloodline and after a lifetime of searching for herself across different cities, Iryna has found a sense of inner harmony and peace.

“This matters. Every person must know who they are, where their roots lie. It is essential. Because only then does everything fall into place. And that is exactly what has finally happened to me.”

Interested in topics about Crimea or Ukrainian communities? Take a deep dive into some of our related coverage.

The commander raising a Crimean battalion to take it back from the Russians

Crimea celebrated, as Trump gives it away

Russian propaganda, funded by Canada

NEWS OF THE DAY

By Oleksandra Poda

Good morning to readers; Kyiv remains in Ukrainian hands.

OCCUPIED CRIMEA INTRODUCES GAS VOUCHERS: Starting May 31, a voucher-based fuel distribution system is being introduced in Crimea, according to the head of the Russian administration in the occupied peninsula. Petrol will be distributed exclusively via coupons, where public and social transport will have priority status. The voucher system will operate without volume restrictions, but the sale of petrol will be limited to 20 litres per person per day and using jerry cans to store the fuel is forbidden.

The fuel crisis in Crimea comes as a result of the Ukrainian Armed Forces’ systematic campaign against Russia’s oil infrastructure. Crimea, as an occupied territory cut off from mainland Ukraine, is particularly vulnerable to supply disruptions.

Residents were told by the occupying administration that the situation is expected to stabilize within 30 days.

RUSSIA HAS ESTABLISHED A NEW DRONE DEFENSE MINISTRY: Russia’s Nizhny Novgorod region has established a separate government body to defend against drone strikes in the region, called the Ministry for Facility Protection.

The decision was made as Ukrainian drone technology improves and is able to launch larger attacks deeper into Russia. Ukraine regularly attacks Nizhny Novgorod, which is located nearly 1,300 km from the front line. Russia is forced to spend administrative, financial, and human resources on protecting its own deep rear infrastructure, rather than attacking Ukraine.

RUSSIA BUILDS LARGEST AIR DEFENSE RING ENCIRCLING MOSCOW: Russia is constructing a ring of air defense which will surround the nation’s capital and some suburbs. The new air defense system will be put on the roofs of civilian buildings in Moscow, using transport helicopters to lift the equipment into place.

The new defense system — the Pantsir-SMD-E — is a modification of the anti-aircraft missile system, specifically designed to combat drones and small aerial targets. As of May 31, at least four Pantsir systems are known to have been installed on the roofs of buildings in Moscow.

For residents of these buildings, this poses an additional risk, as debris from downed drones or interceptors could fall on residential areas.

DOG OF WAR

This pup is waiting for its little owner after her after-school classes.

Stay safe out there.

Best,
Kateryna.

Editor’s Note:

A Russian drone injuring people in a NATO and EU member state marks a significant moment in this war. This story will likely continue beyond today’s headlines.

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On the night of May 28-29, a Russian drone crossed into Romanian airspace and crashed onto the roof of a residential building in Galati, injuring two people and causing a fire. This marks the first confirmed civilian injuries by a Russian drone directly on NATO territory since the start of the full-scale invasion.

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KYIV, Ukraine — The fresh smell of burning still filled the air in the market, near the Lukianivskyi metro station in Kyiv.

Volunteers of Dobrobat, an initiative that assists with emergency cleanup and rebuilding after strikes, together with other civilians were clearing the rubble of the destroyed shopping center that was leveled in a massive strike on May 24. The area was cordoned off with striped tape to protect civilians from further collapses and preserve evidence of war crimes for investigators.

Against the backdrop of smoke and ash, the scent of flowers feels unexpectedly out of place. The return of life to this place carried the scent of fresh peonies, daisies, and daffodils.

“If Death has not come to you yet, then it won’t kill you,” said Halyna Klymenko, one of the local vendors who was selling flowers on the market.

This area has long been shaped by informal street trade, particularly by elderly women selling flowers grown in their gardens or picked in the Ukrainian forests. The first informal flower stalls began to appear here, alongside the development of the surrounding residential district of the same name. Since then, it has become a local spot where Kyiv residents stop by in the mornings to buy fresh produce.

Lukianivska district has become one of the most destroyed and heavily struck areas in Kyiv, where in the last attack missile hits even damaged the metro station — causing residents to question whether there is a completely safe shelter in the district. Residents often do not have time to replace their damaged windows before the next blast wave hits.

Despite the frequent strikes and the near-complete destruction of the local market by fires, the stall sellers cannot wait until it is renewed. They need to make ends meet and continue to brighten locals’ mornings with fresh fruit and bouquets of flowers as a reminder that life goes on here despite the death and destruction.

Halyna Klymenko, wearing a traditional Ukrainian headscarf decorated with a colorful ornament, was gently adjusting bouquets of peonies in every shade of pink. She smiled at her customers, inviting them to buy her fresh flowers with a bright spark in her eyes.

A mother and daughter approach Halyna, saying they have never seen such fresh flowers before.

“I planted them, and they bloomed after three years,” said Halyna.

Being 72 years old with a trade experience of 15 years, she regularly travels more than a hundred of kilometers from her native city of Pereyaslav in central Ukraine. She grows peonies there. Even though Halyna’s daughter helps cover her utility bills, her pension of around 4,000 hryvnias (approximately $90 USD) is not enough to live on, so she needs to continue working.

For the past two years she has been selling at this location, although earlier she worked closer to the Kharkivskyi residential district on Kyiv’s left bank of the Dnipro river.

“There were no people anymore [as many of them fled Ukraine during the war]. Here the sirens are going off, but people are still standing,” she said.

Halyna arrives here every day around 10 a.m., no matter what.

Since the beginning of the full-scale invasion, the immediate area around Lukianivska Square and its surrounding infrastructure has been struck at least eight times. While the market had previously recovered quickly after indirect attacks, the current damage is so severe that it will require reconstruction from the ground up.

Halyna has a simple belief that if death is destined it will happen, which has already become a common mindset for Ukrainians in the fifth year of the full-scale war.

That’s why a fairly large number of people stop by the destroyed market. Some choose flowers for a celebration, others buy carrots and potatoes to prepare a fragrant meal. The line briefly disperses under a cold May rain, but as soon as the sun returns people step out from under the awnings and continue their shopping.

Elderly women vendors near Halyna’s spot are laying out their goods brought in from their home regions. Another customer approaches them.

“The people here are good. I like supporting those who, despite all circumstances, still manage to get here at night by different trains and commuter lines,” says Vira Usenko, who has been buying natural, organic products at this market for more than 40 years. She keeps returning here as a customer every time.

Vira walks away smiling, carrying bags full of food, her thick hair blowing in the wind while leaving the ruins behind.

Interested in topics about the ways Ukrainian civilians cope with the consequences of Russian attacks? Take a deep dive into some of our related coverage.

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How mothers explain war to our children

Should Ukrainians have legal guns?

Chinese generators explode during Kharkiv blackouts

War ruined my lifesaving medicine

NEWS OF THE DAY:

By Ivanna Shvets

Good morning to readers; Kyiv remains in Ukrainian hands.

ZELENSKYY WARNS TRUMP OF CRITICAL PATRIOT SHORTAGE: President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has issued an extraordinary, direct letter to U.S. President Trump and the U.S. Congress, warning of a critical depletion of Patriot missile interceptors. The letter, published by journalist Barak Ravid, stresses that Ukraine remains “almost completely” dependent on Washington to counter missile threats, noting that the weapons supplied by the NATO-backed Prioritized Ukraine Requirements List (PURL) have fallen short of the current threat level.

The plea follows a staggering barrage of Russian attacks on May 24, during which Moscow unleashed 90 missiles and 600 strike drones across Ukraine, including “Oreshnik” intermediate-range ballistic missiles that struck Bila Tserkva, a city 50 km from Kyiv.

RUSSIAN BANKERS TO START SHOOTING DOWN DRONES: Russian lawmakers have passed a bill allowing trained bank employees to shoot down and jam Ukrainian drones amid an increase in Ukrainian strikes on domestic infrastructure, Al Jazeera reported. The draft legislation mandates that financial institutions, including the central bank and the majority state-owned Sberbank, finance and install electronic jamming systems on their premises.

This would allow Russia to greatly expand its air defense capabilities as there are banks located in the majority of towns.

KYIV FORMALIZES TIES WITH BELARUSIAN DEMOCRATIC FORCES: During her first official trip to Ukraine, Belarusian opposition leader Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya held talks with President Zelenskyy in Kyiv. The meeting centered on countering the threats posed by Russian destabilization and Belarus’s President Aleksander Lukashenko, and coordinating the release of Belarusian POWS captured while fighting for Ukraine, and political detainees imprisoned in Belarus for supporting Ukraine.

To strengthen systematic coordination, Ukraine has appointed Yaroslav Chornohor as its first ambassador-at-large for cooperation with Belarusian democratic forces, which officially opened a new mission office in the Ukrainian capital.

LATVIA RAMPS UP DEFENSE AFTER UKRAINIAN DRONE INCURSION: Latvia is reinforcing its 400-kilometer border with Russia and Belarus by deploying tactical teams equipped with 10-km radius “killer drones”, Reuters reported.

Neighboring Lithuania is conducting tests of drone detection systems in the Kaunas region, utilizing various drone platforms to benchmark tracking capabilities, Hromadske reported.

These defensive measures follow several incidents where Ukrainian strike drones, targeting Russia’s Baltic oil loading ports, were thrown off course by Russian electronic jamming and as a result flew into NATO airspace.

DOG OF WAR:

This Doberman is walked by our reporter Kateryna’s daughter. The girl says that Yarchik (the dog’s name) isn’t the best first client.

Stay safe out there.

Best,
Anastasiia

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TAIPEI, Taiwan – Houcunyan Airfield, a riverside park about an hour’s drive from Taipei, is one of the most popular places where drone pilots go to train. One afternoon in May, with heat and humidity drawing out mosquitoes, Lee Ding-Yu and his student, who is a photographer, were training at Houcunyan Airfield. “He’s taking the exam tomorrow,” Ding-Yu said, pointing at his student. “I brought all the drone batteries here so that he can practice as long as he wants.”

The sound of drones drowns out everything else, resembling the sounds of a modern war. Others in the park can barely hear one another speak.

During President Trump’s most recent visit to Beijing, he referred to Taiwan as a “very good negotiating chip,” also mentioning in an interview with Fox that he is thinking about whether to approve the latest arms sales to Taiwan, raising questions about a broader American foreign policy shift favorable toward China despite its threats to invade Taiwan.

The timing of his statements potentially violates President Reagan’s Six Assurances to Taiwan, passed in 1982, promising that the U.S. will not consult with the People’s Republic of China (PRC) on arms sales, and will not pressure Taiwan to negotiate with Beijing.

On May 21, the U.S. acting Navy Secretary, Hung Cao, told senators that U.S. arms shipments to Taiwan have been paused due to the Iran War. But with drone technology dominating modern warfare, training to operate drones has become a key survival skill.

Although Trump claimed that he didn’t make any commitment to China during their meeting, he also said the U.S. doesn’t want to travel 9,500 miles to fight a war. When asked about the decision to pause the arms sale to Taiwan, he told reporters that he will speak to the president of Taiwan about the weapons package.

Amidst this U.S. hesitation to provide support to the island, Taiwanese civilians are taking it upon themselves to prepare for the worst case scenario. If Taiwan loses support from the U.S., it could devastate a nation preparing to defend itself against one of the strongest militaries in the world. Democratic allies in the Indo-Pacific could face stronger aggression from China, further emboldening autocracy in the region.

Ding-Yu used to be a daily news reporter for United Daily News in Taipei, where he followed the emerging drone industry in Taiwan closely. After studying English in university and working as a reporter for almost 20 years, he never thought he would become a drone trainer.

He has always been good at literature, but has a special knack for electronics and mechanics. His first job was as a PCB layout engineer, which he said was “too boring,” not knowing at the time that it would propel him toward his second career in the drone space.

While maintaining his full-time job as a reporter, Ding-Yu started practicing using different kinds of drones to gather video footage. It’s not that he was actively preparing for an imminent Chinese invasion. In fact, he just found flying drones and learning their capabilities entertaining. In 2025, he became a certified professional drone trainer in Taiwan, a civilian role separate from the Taiwanese army.

“If China attacked one day, we might be conscripted,” Ding-Yu joked He is one of nearly 35,000 certified drone pilots, though professional trainers like him are fewer than 3,000. Though he approached the idea of a war on his turf playfully, Ding-Yu has a patriotic heart: “It would be my duty to serve the country.”

The Taiwanese have been learning from Ukraine’s tactics in its fight against Russia, especially how drone technology has been dominating the battlefield. This style of warfare aligns with the asymmetric warfare strategy that Taiwan would deploy to counter a possible Chinese invasion.

Last November, Taiwanese President Lai Ching-Te announced an eight-year special defense budget of $40 billion USD, not only to meet President Trump’s expectation that allies raise their defense budgets, but also to strengthen Taiwan’s defense capabilities and build a military supply chain that does not rely on China.

The special budget had been stuck in Congress for six months and finally passed on May 8, but in a crippled form. The opposing parties cut the budget down to $24 billion, slashing the drone development spending and drone countermeasure procurement for the military.

The new, reduced version of the bill only specifies arms purchases from the United States, including an $11 billion arms package for Taiwan announced last December, meaning that Taiwan’s defense will lack self-made modern technology and become more dependent.

Ding-Yu remembered watching a video of a drone that was carrying a bomb flying over the battlefield in Ukraine when he realized he had just witnessed the future of battlefields before his eyes. He was curious about its path and fascinated by what happened next.

“The drone dropped the bomb itself. I was shocked,” said Ding-Yu.

That image stayed in Ding-Yu’s head for a long time and would eventually lead him to become a professional drone trainer in Taiwan.

The Taiwanese government, at the same time, has been building demand and expanding drone usage across the public sector, such as agriculture, policing, and land surveying.

“I have trained some firefighters and cops,” said Ding-Yu. “For example, I helped the firefighters to use drones to find where the fire started or how to get into the building if the entrance was blocked.”

The training experience for Ding-Yu is not much different from reporting daily news. When he was a crime reporter, he had to find the locations of dead bodies. He wished he had a drone for searching. “I had to get so close that I could smell it,” said Ding-Yu.

Ding-Yu loved his job in journalism until he was transferred to cover politics. “It was exhausting. I had to write and take photos all by myself.” He complained, but it was then he found his new passion.

“I realized photos are two-dimensional, but with a drone I can make it three-dimensional,” Ding-Yu said.

Disasters such as floods and fires mimic the conditions of war enough to practice reconnaissance with drones, but many in the field only know how to operate drones on a basic level without knowing how much a drone can accomplish.

Compared to real wars, the current training in the military is unrealistic, said Huang Jheng-Jie, a former firefighter and now a certified drone pilot. Most people are aiming to get the drone-operator certificate. They can fly, but they don’t know where to fly.

Jheng-Jie believes the current training offered by the government could be improved to unveil the full capabilities of these drones. “It’s like driving a car,” he said. “All the firefighters know how to drive a car. But not all of them know how to use it to help the team get into the fire building safely.”

Though China has not yet waged war on Taiwan, servicemen from the military realized they need to improve . Both Ding-Yu and Jheng-Jie have trained not only civilians to operate drones but soldiers, too.

Depending on the brigade, internal training doesn’t satisfy the soldiers. That’s when civilian training comes in.

Jheng-Jie, who served the country as a firefighter for 13 years, believes one should always prepare for a rainy day. He thinks the country doesn’t have enough drone operators, which he sees as a massive opportunity for business. “We can’t stop training, and we can’t stop innovating [drones],” he said.

That roughly $15 billion cut from the Cabinet’s original proposal includes major reductions in drone-related funding. Kuomintang congresswoman Ma Wen-chun claimed government drone procurements in recent years are “bad”(不好用), criticizing domestically-made Taiwanese drones for having a bad reputation.

Jheng-Jie has a different point of view. “Foreign drones, even American ones, sometimes have trouble ‘adapting’ in Taiwan,” he said. “For example, the communication systems aren’t always the same.”

Hence, the best path forward is to develop Taiwan’s own drone systems. “You can’t rely on other countries all the time. Or your drones won’t be able to catch up with the newest technology.”

Taiwan’s military drone development could be hit hard without enough budget from the government to support it. Ding-Yu, though, remains positive. “The defense minister is finding his way out,” he said, emphasizing that drones are the trend. ”It doesn’t affect the civilians who want to learn.”

The more people who learn to operate the tech, the bigger the demand for production can be. Ding-Yu is devoted to building a bigger drone training market. He is a member of the Drone Advancement Association, which is hosting a ‘Drone Soccer Game’ in New Taipei City at the end of May. “We saw China hosting these games, and we believe it’s a good chance to involve kids practicing drones since they were young,” Ding-Yu said.

Drone Soccer Game

Due to data security concerns, the Executive Yuan, the highest administrative department in Taiwan, announced in 2020 the prohibition of using Chinese drones interfacing with civil service systems, including the most popular Chinese drone, DJI.

Following the government ban on DJI, Ding-Yu’s students from the public sector are looking to use drones that aren’t from China, or preferably, Taiwan-made drones. “I was told they had to smash and destroy all the DJI drones,” he told The Counteroffensive. “They don’t want any government data to leak.”

But using DJI drones does have some advantages. DJI drones occupy 70 percent of the global market, and with bulk production, the prices are very competitive and the quality is high. .

Ding-Yu operated a DJI drone and compared it with other Taiwanese-branded drones. “It’s more stable in the positioning mode,” he said, meaning that it’s easier for rookies to learn for recreational use.

Jheng-Jie believes that Taiwan can create competitive drones if it takes lessons from Chinese ones.

Before the war in Ukraine,only a few Taiwanese companies persistently built anti-China drones — it was more of an ideology. The goal of making “anti-China” drones is to produce drones without parts or assemblies from China, secure the military source supply chain, and avoid confidential data breaches.

The CEO of Carbon-Based Technology Inc, Stacy Yu, is proud to say that anti-China technology is in the company’s DNA, but it was hard to expand in the past few years due to high cost.

But for drone companies that are trying to build technology to protect Taiwanese interests, the biggest challenge is coming from inside Taiwan. “We couldn’t get the orders from the defense department because the budget bill was on hold,” said Stacy Yu. “We still have to rely on the foreign market.”

The U.S. arms sales package includes thousands of American drones. If Trump withdraws the deal, Taiwan will lose its most important “anti-China” supply before the domestic drone supply chain becomes solid.

As these companies strive to survive in the market, they also face baseless accusations. Stacy Yu wrote on Facebook that the opposing parties are smearing her company as benefiting from the ruling party to make a fortune. “It is unacceptable!” wrote Stacy.

When asked whether Taiwanese drones could give them an advantage on the battlefield if China invades, Ding-Yu fell quiet. “No one wants a war,” he said. Even though he believes that the chance of a war with China remains low, the reality is hard to predict.

The best way forward is for Taiwan to enhance itself and, even better, to learn from its enemies. Ding-Yu reminisced about his visit to Shenzhen, China, where he ordered bubble tea delivered by a drone. “That’s a good idea,” Ding-Yu said, pointing out that Taiwan could copy from China to build a bigger market for its domestic drones.

Both the Taiwanese government and civilians are trying to build resilience for a potential Chinese invasion. The challenges can’t be overcome in a short time, and never has the U.S. president’s stance on Taiwan felt so consequential.

Interested in topics about Taiwan? Take a deep dive into some of our related coverage.

How China would cut Taiwan off

The ‘Red Beaches’ of a Taiwan invasion

Taiwan stinky tofu stalls hit by Iran war shock

NEWS OF THE DAY:

By Anastasia Lutsenko

Good morning to readers; Kyiv remains in Ukrainian hands.

ROYAL AIR FORCE JET WITH UK DEFSEC JAMMED OVER RUSSIAN BORDER: UK Defence Secretary John Healey was aboard a Royal Air Force jet, when the aircraft had its GPS signal jammed while flying near the Russian border. This happened after Healey visited British troops in Estonia, the Times reported. The pilots were forced to switch to an alternative navigation system during the three-hour flight, and Russia is believed to be behind the interference, according to reports.

Last month, Russian fighter jets dangerously intercepted an RAF surveillance aircraft over the Black Sea. A Russian aircraft flew close enough to disable the plane’s autopilot, while another made several passes, some just six metres from the aircraft’s nose. Similar GPS jamming also affected a plane carrying former Defence Secretary Grant Shapps in 2024.

NATO GENSEC’S UKRAINE INITIATIVE HAS FAILED: The UK, France, Spain, Italy, and Canada have reportedly blocked a NATO proposal that would require member states to spend at least 0.25% of GDP annually on military aid for Ukraine. NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte said the initiative failed to gain unanimous support, which is necessary for approval within NATO.

Several countries are already spending over 0.25% on military aid for Ukraine, this includes the Netherlands, Poland, and Nordic and Baltic states. These members backed the initiative. While the UK remains one of Ukraine’s largest military supporters after the U.S. and Germany, its contribution is still below the proposed target, with Prime Minister Keir Starmer pledging around 0.1% of GDP annually. France, Spain, Italy, and Canada also contribute less proportionally than many smaller NATO allies.

UKRAINIAN INTEL UNCOVERS RUSSIA’S “GERAN-4” JET DRONE: Defence Intelligence of Ukraine has published a detailed analysis of Russia’s new “Geran-4” jet-powered strike drone, including a 3D model, components, and technical specifications. According to Ukrainian intelligence, Russia developed the drone as a countermeasure against the growing effectiveness of Ukrainian interceptor drones. The “Geran-4” has a turbojet engine, allowing it to maneuver at speeds of 300–400 km/h and reach a top speed of up to 500 km/h. The drone can carry warheads weighing up to 90 kg over distances of up to 450 km.

Ukrainian intelligence identified two Chinese-made engines used in the drone, stressing that restricting Russia’s access to foreign technology is essential to limiting its military capabilities. This comes after Western components were recently found in a missile which attacked Kyiv.

UKRAINIAN COMPANY LAUNCHES SECURE AI MODEL: Ukraine has launched a new AI assistant called Lapathoniia, built on domestic large language models and hosted entirely within Ukrainian data centers. According to the AI developers, all user data stays inside Ukraine and is not transferred to foreign servers, strengthening control and security over Ukrainian data.

The platform is still in closed beta testing, with developers collecting feedback to improve performance and usability, and access is currently granted upon request.

DOG OF PEACE:

Today’s dog of peace is this cute Dalmatian. We saw him on a crowded street, waiting alone for his owner. The owner came quickly to pick him up. He seems to be with a happy family!

Stay safe out there.

Best,
Elaine

Editor’s Note:

Last night, as Zelenskyy warned of an incoming Russian attack, Tim reached out to the team at The Counteroffensive.

The next morning, Myroslava, our managing editor, checked in to make sure each member of our team had survived the night, as she does after every big attack.

This is how our team supports one another during wartime. And your support, as readers and paid subscribers, is the reason we are able to keep doing our jobs.

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Tip Jar!

For the first time, Russia used the Oreshnik hypersonic missile against Kyiv Oblast, a medium-range ballistic missile capable of carrying nuclear or conventional warheads that Russia claims no existing air defense system can intercept. It struck the city of Bila Tserkva, located 80 kilometers (about 50 miles) south of the capital.

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Anxious employees rushed around the room, pulling out servers and frantically trying to bring them back online. Nothing was working at the Khimvolokno plant in Hrodna, Belarus, which produces nylon threads for Russian body armor and helmets. A significant part of the enterprise’s IT infrastructure was effectively paralyzed.

In the middle of the chaos, they failed to notice that they were being watched the entire time live via hacked CCTV cameras inside the facility. It was one of the recent public cyberattacks carried out by the Belarusian anonymous hacker community ‘Cyber Partisans,’ launched on the anniversary of Russia’s full-scale war this February.

“It’s rare that we get to observe what happens [on-site] after an attack is completed…It’s always entertaining,” said one of the hackers, who goes by the name Vasilek.

There have already been at least 50 publicly known cyberattacks by a group of around 90 volunteers, targeting key state institutions and infrastructure in Russia and Belarus that are aiding Russia’s war effort. After Russian troops used Belarusian territory to invade northern Ukraine in 2022, Minsk has continued providing logistical, infrastructural, and military support to the Kremlin.

Russia does not seem to be stopping its pressure on Lukashenko to drag the country deeper into the war. This week, Ukraine warned that Russia may consider reopening the front from Belarus, potentially launching an offensive toward the Chernihiv-Kyiv axis or even against one of NATO’s member states. If it happens, it would signal that Belarus has become a full satellite of the Kremlin, stripped of any real sovereignty. The Cyber Partisans have made it their mission to make Belarus’s support as costly as possible.

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October, 2023. Viktor Chernyshov is riding in a taxi through Narva, the border city marking the Estonia-Russia line. It became his refuge after Russian soldiers broke into his own home in Ukraine twice.

The car moves smoothly along the even road, while Viktor looks out the window at rows of Soviet-era residential blocks built during Stalin’s time.

Suddenly, the driver sighs: “If only Russia were here…”

“Do you realize you’d be getting paid in rubles then?” Viktor responds.

“Why in rubles? I’m in Europe.”

“How do you think Russia works? Rubles are used there. In the occupied territories, too,” he shot back.

“Oh… right?”

Silence filled the car.

Viktor can no longer count how many times he has encountered similar interactions with local Narva residents. Located just 200 meters from the Russian border, the city has become a center of aggressive Russification since the Soviet times, even after Estonia gained its independence. About 97 percent of its residents speak Russian, and a significant portion hold Russian citizenship.

Viktor’s home region of Luhansk was Russified 12 years ago before being exploited by separatist sentiments intended to launch an invasion. Now he sees the same scenario, hundreds of kilometers from his homeland, repeating.

In February 2026, narratives urging the creation of a so-called ‘Narva People’s Republic’ independent of Estonia began circulating on social media. Estonian investigative journalists later linked the campaign’s early posts to a pro-Kremlin network in St Petersburg as a part of a Russian disinformation operation against the EU countries.

Russia has long been testing the eastern NATO flank with hybrid aggression — frequently violating its airspace with fighter jets or drones. However, a check of public sentiment in Estonia through separatist memes and ‘fun’ videos may mask a new phase of Russian pressure, creating a buffer if it dares to attack the alliance directly.

So when Viktor heard some Narva residents he met openly wish for Russia’s return, involuntary flashbacks appeared before his eyes.

In April 2014, he was doing what he always did — fishing near his hometown in the Luhansk region with friends. They were all in their early twenties, and the river near Lysychansk was a familiar spot.

Then the men appeared: unfamiliar and wearing green uniforms.

“Guys, you’d better stay out of the forest,” the military men warned Viktor and his friends. “There are tripwires there. You’d better not go.”

Shortly after Viktor’s encounter with the soldiers, a mortar shell exploded near his home — the first of many.

He remembers his cat scampering in panic; outside tank tracks pressed into the ground near his grandmother’s house. But Viktor had stopped running down to the basement shelter by the second day of heavy shelling.

“I just slept at home. I didn’t care anymore,” Viktor said. “I only wanted to sleep. There was no water, no electricity.”

It was the start of the Russian occupation in the east, when pro-Russian militants and Russian special forces seized the Donetsk regional administration building, declaring the creation of the illegal ‘Donetsk People’s Republicʼ and later a similar one in Luhansk.

The Kremlin, of course, initially denied its participation in the event. Russia’s purpose of creating pseudo-republics on Ukrainian territory was to simulate the illusion that the Donetsk and Luhansk regions themselves wanted to break away from Ukraine, claiming that Kyiv was allegedly oppressing them.

After two years under Russian occupation, Viktor left his hometown, having struggled to find employment. When he moved to Odesa, Lysychansk Refinery, where he worked as a process operator, was effectively frozen after oil supplies to the enterprise were halted.

Viktor has been living out of suitcases since.

He worked his way through three more cities in search of better work and opportunities, even landing in Tbilisi, Georgia, right after the war’s new phase in early 2022. After a year in the sunny country, Viktor still faced a language barrier and high living costs.

Viktor’s father works in Czechia and told him there was a region in Estonia with a large Russian-speaking population, where it might be possible to find work without a language barrier.

So it became Viktor’s next destination, where he still is today. Viktor settled in Narva and became a design engineer at a local company, hoping he wouldn’t have to pack his suitcase once more.

“The only moment I started to doubt my decision to come here was when Russian narratives became louder and more varied,” he said. “We know them well. There was this idea that the Baltic states could be taken over. At some point, that did make me feel uneasy,” he said.

Viktor added that community fear around Russian takeover of the Baltic states made him feel “uneasy.” Narva currently remains one of the most heavily Russified cities in Europe — largely due to Russian workers flooding the city sent by the USSR while it restricted Estonian movement following World War II. As the USSR sent Russian workers to the city and restricted Estonians from returning there after the war.

The demographic makeover even caused a portion of the Russian-speaking population in the region to fail language and citizenship exams in independent Estonia. As a result, many residents received the status of ‘persons with undetermined citizenship,’ often informally referred to as an ‘alien’ passport,’ while others retained Russian citizenship. Among them were some Narva residents.

“They thought a Russian passport would be stronger or more reliable,” Viktor said. “That was mostly back in the 2000s. They didn’t change it later and just kept it.”

A significant number of people in Narva, he added, still feel connected to Russia through family and relatives.

Many Estonian citizens use Russian tourist visas to cross the border at times, such as during holidays like Easter and New Year’s, Viktor recalled.

The Estonia-Russia border in Narva is heavily patrolled, as Russians illegally cross border in various populated areas as part of provocations. In December 2025, unauthorized Russian border guards appeared on the Estonian side of the Narva River for 20 minutes.

Russian tourist entry has been effectively prohibited, full customs checks have been implemented, and 24-hour border crossings have been replaced with limited daytime operating hours since May 2024.

However, Russia has now brought provocations to another level, as images of black-and-white flags of the so-called Narva People’s Republic now flood Facebook, TikTok, VK and Russian messenger like Telegram.

The posts contain even an alleged anthem, military patches and coat of arms of the fake republic.

The images are a reminder for Viktor as to why he always keeps a stocked backpack, full tank of fuel, and some cash on hand. But Viktor’s friends from Narva aren’t as fearful toward the rumors.

“I was telling them that in the event of an invasion, they wouldn’t have time to do anything — no time to pack, no time to leave. Narva would be the first to come on under pressure because it could be entered very easily,” he noted.

According to Viktor, if Russian troops were to attack, they would have two entrance points: a road bridge, still in use, and a railway bridge, still carrying freight trains — both allowing soldiers to be inside Narva almost instantly.

Russians displayed a live translation from Moscow’s military parade, which could be seen from Narva city on May 9, 2026. Instagram: @Pandanjan.

Due to significant losses in Ukraine, Russia will likely struggle to sustain a new front in the near future. However, the latest May report by the Estonian Armed Forces suggests that Russia may soon restore its combat capabilities, and “if it then perceives a favorable opportunity somewhere to use its military, it will do so.”

Estonia has effectively withstood Russian influences by blocking Kremlin-linked propaganda media and monitoring extremist activity, disinformation networks, and online groups spreading similar hybrid narratives.

“Someone once told me that there was a woman who was very actively pushing these ideas on Facebook. The authorities contacted her, took her somewhere for a conversation, warned her that she should stop or she would face deportation. And after that, it all stopped,” Viktor recalled.

Along the wider border zone, a network of around 600 reinforced concrete bunkers and defensive positions is being developed by Estonian security authorities to withstand heavy artillery strikes.

In cooperation with Finland, Estonia is also working on plans to counter the Russian Baltic Fleet and protect undersea infrastructure, involving NATO naval forces.

But living in Narva doesn’t let Viktor forget that constantly reminded that Russia is right next door. Even during his usual fishing trips he can still see a Russian border guard posted on a nearby the bridge.

“You don’t do anything to him, and he doesn’t do anything to you. But it still irritates you — that tricolor flag waving there on the other side, just a piece of cloth, and that’s it,” he said.

But Viktor never lets his guard down fully. The last time he received a notification about an Estonian airspace violation was this afternoon, on May 19.

Interested in topics about the risks NATO has experienced during the Russian war? Take a deep dive into some of our related coverage.

Should NATO shoot down Russian jets

Russian drone explodes on NATO territory

Shadowing Russian hybrid warfare ships in the Baltic Sea

NEWS OF THE DAY:

By Ivanna Shvets

Good morning to readers; Kyiv remains in Ukrainian hands.

UKRAINE’S FIRST DOMESTICALLY PRODUCED GLIDE BOMB: Brave1 defense cluster announced that Ukraine’s first domestically developed glide bomb, the Vyrivniuvach (Ukrainian for “Equalizer”), has completed all required trials and is ready for combat, according to the Business Insider.

Developed over 17 months by the Brave1, the weapon carries a 250-kilogram warhead and was built entirely from scratch rather than being adapted from older Soviet systems.

The new bomb is designed to strike targets far behind enemy lines regardless of weather conditions. Ukrainian Air Force pilots are currently rehearsing combat scenarios to deploy the high-precision weapon in active frontline operations.

BELARUS AND RUSSIA LAUNCH JOINT NUCLEAR DRILLS: Belarusian officials recently stated they are conducting coordinated military exercises with Russia to practice the use of tactical nuclear weapons that Moscow recently stationed in the country, according to Associated Press.

These joint maneuvers underscore the deepening military integration between the two allies. Belarus recently ramped up mobilization and combat training, while Zelenskyy recently said that there is evidence that Moscow is pushing Belarus to become more involved in military action against Ukraine.

INJURED RUSSIAN TROOPS SENT TO CIVILIAN HOSPITALS: Russian military hospitals are reportedly struggling to accommodate the influx of soldiers wounded in the war against Ukraine, prompting authorities to turn to civilian healthcare facilities. The Russian Defense Ministry is taking over maternity wards and specialized clinics across the country to treat military personnel.

Medical staff in St. Petersburg have reported that wounded soldiers are currently housed in almost every major hospital, which puts a significant strain on medical supplies intended for civilians. Such strain on the healthcare system comes alongside a severe national shortage of medical workers — last year, the Russian Health Minister said the country needed at least 23,000 more doctors and 63,600 paramedical staff.

U.S. EXTENDS RUSSIAN OIL WAIVER: The U.S. has extended a waiver on Russian oil sales as President Donald Trump attempts to curb rising global fuel prices exacerbated by the ongoing war with Iran, the Financial Times reports. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent announced that the department is extending the waiver by issuing a new 30-day license to allow vulnerable nations temporary access to Russian oil currently stranded at sea. The move comes as Brent crude prices surged past $110 a barrel, driving voter frustration over the economic costs associated with the conflict in the Middle East.

CAT OF CONFLICT:

Sasha saw this cat near her apartment building. No matter what people think of his black fur, the days she meets him are always lucky.

Stay safe out there.

Best,
Anastasiia

Editor’s Note:

Ukrainian forces are turning the tide. There’s good news for what seems like the first in a long time. Read on for what that is.

But it’s not over yet — we need your help to continue our courageous reporting. Upgrade today to support the most talented group of young journalists in Ukraine.

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TIP JAR!

Tim Kennedy was one of the world’s most famous Mixed Martial Arts fighters.

But it isn’t his career, but instead the story of why Kennedy quit fighting that is relevant here.

In September 2014, he fought Yoel Romero, a fierce Cuban wrestler. Midway through the fight, Kennedy was dominating. As the bell signaled the end of the round, he was landing devastating strikes to Romero’s head, nearly knocking him out.

As the third and final round started, Romero didn’t rise to fight. His corner, desperate to stall for time to give their man more time to recover, feigned confusion.

Kennedy thought he had won; after all, that is what should have happened. Instead, the referee permitted the fight to go on.

Romero stood up, late, and a bewildered Kennedy was knocked out soon thereafter.

Think of the last time you had an angry, no-holds-barred confrontation with someone. It doesn’t necessarily have to have been physical.

But after the initial anger and adrenaline rush subsides, you’re left with shaky hands, a pounding heart, and a sort of light headedness.

That’s an adrenaline crash. When your body senses a fight is over, it tries to return to normalcy, but often that sudden withdrawal leads to exhaustion — even depression.

Kennedy claims that was the end of his career: “My heart got broken.”

In his mind, the fight had been over. When this was reversed, he was unable to get in the competition mindset again.

I suspect the same will soon happen with Russian military forces.

Vladimir Putin is so often credited with being a mastermind and a cunning, calculating ex-spy. That reputation is largely exaggerated, and his comment this week indicates why.

Last weekend he endured the humiliation of a tempered Victory Day parade in Moscow, enabled by Zelenskyy’s promise not to attack it. In the aftermath, he said he thought “the [conflict] is coming to an end.”

I had dinner with a Ukrainian military officer this past week, and he told me no Ukrainian soldier is likely to take this claim seriously. Ukrainians won’t believe his lies and machinations.

Who might? Only the people who are prone to taking Putin credulously: his own forces, his own people.

I can only imagine what a hungry Russian soldier on the frontlines might do with Putin’s latest claim. No one wants to be the last person killed in a war. Psychologically, an indication by your boss’ boss’ boss that the war is ending is sure to dull any motivation you might still have to go on.

Meanwhile, this is all happening amid Russian battlefield and political losses – the first round of good news for Ukraine in a long while.

1. Just last night the Moscow region came under the largest drone attack since the start of the full-scale war.
   
   Monitoring channels reported up to 300 Ukrainian drones approaching from several directions. Numerous electronics plants were struck, as was a fuel transfer station and an oil depot. A cruise missile manufacturer — known for manufacturing projectiles that hit Ukrainian cities — was also hit.
   
   Simultaneously with the Moscow attack, occupied Crimea also came under a mass drone strike, where explosions were reported at the Kacha airfield, Kozacha Bay, Inkerman, and Sevastopol.
   

2. Orban has been wrested from power in Hungary, depriving Russia of its closest ally inside the European Union, and paving the way for more economic support for the Ukrainian economy.
   

3. Russia has some 1.3 million killed, wounded and missing, the UK estimates. And more continue every day.
   

4. At least 40 percent of Russia’s export oil export capacity has been stopped due to Ukrainian strikes, preventing them from fully experiencing a windfall from Trump’s war in Iran.
   

5. In April, Russia suffered the first net loss in territory since August 2024, the Institute for the Study of War reported.

Putin is trapped, and he’s just given his own troops one hell of an adrenaline crash.

NEWS OF THE DAY:

By Oleskandra Poda

Good morning to readers; Kyiv remains in Ukrainian hands.

U.S. LET RUSSIAN OIL SANCTIONS WAIVER EXPIRE WITHOUT RENEWAL: The waiver permitting purchases of Russian oil stranded at sea expired at 12:01 a.m. Eastern Daylight Time on May 16 without renewal. After the waiver expired, restrictions preventing countries like India from purchasing Russian oil were reimposed. Two Democratic senators pushed for the waiver not to be renewed, saying that there was no evidence it had succeeded in easing price hikes for Americans.

The previous license had been extended twice despite public statements from the U.S. Treasury saying it would not be renewed.

LATVIA WARNS OF AIR THREAT NEAR RUSSIAN BORDER: On the morning of May 17, Latvia’s National Armed Forces warned of a possible threat to the country’s airspace in several regions near the Russian border after an unidentified drone was spotted in the sky. The military deployed additional air defense units to the eastern border.

This is the second such incident in three days. On the night of May 14-15, Latvia’s National Armed Forces also warned about a possible airspace threat near the Russian border in the Krāslava, Ludza, Balvi and Rēzekne regions.

1,000-FOR-1,000 PRISONER SWAP ENTERS NEXT STAGE: On May 17, Zelensky confirmed that negotiations on the next stages of the 1,000-for-1,000 prisoner exchange are ongoing. The first stage took place on May 15 — where 205 soldiers from each side returned home.

Prisoner swaps remains the only tangible result of the ongoing attempts at peace negotiations between Ukraine and Russia.

DOG OF WAR:

This dog looks like it’s so tired of the office life and just wants a little vacation.

Stay safe out there.

Best,
Tim and Oleksandra

When policemen stopped his car near the city of Ternopil, they recognized Oleh Rybachuk without even asking for his passport.

This was the 2010s, the era of Putin-backed president Viktor Yanukovych, when the police had a good memory for faces.

“What are you doing?” they asked about his current occupation.

“I’m fighting against the criminal [Yanukovych] regime,” Oleh replied.

One of the officers let out a stifled laugh and asked, “So what have you been doing before?”

“I was part of such a regime,” he said, implying his Soviet past.

“Godspeed,” the police sighed, letting him go.

Once a USSR customs officer, Oleh became a Secretary of State to President Yushchenko in 2005 and then later a prominent civil activist.

His disgust towards Russia hasn’t waned over the years, but an invitation to the Kremlin to meet Putin might have added a new edge to it.

Historians, analysts, and even fiction writers have always been trying to get into criminals’ heads and reveal what pushed them to commit atrocities. A better understanding of evil is vital to protect lives from future crimes. On the other hand, it has a hidden temptation to exaggerate the villain’s grandeur and complexity, which eventually leads us to dig deeper and look for the traits we might be able to sympathize with.

On May 15, Vladimir Putin appeared on U.S. screens in the new film The Wizard of the Kremlin, directed by a French, British, and American crew led by Olivier Assayas. After the premiere at the 82nd Venice International Film Festival in August 2025, the movie received controversial reviews. Ukrainian critics are accusing it of romanticizing Russia and a lack of empathy for Ukrainians, as Putin’s humanized portrayal during the active war is a sensitive topic.

Intended to tell the story of how Vladimir Putin rose to power, the film once again shifts attention to the authoritarian regime and portrays its current leader as a reserved, cunning, unmistakable strategist who thinks through his every step. With scenes of Putin doing sports and eating simple meals, you’ll get just what Russian propaganda wants you to see.

Russia and other authoritarian regimes skillfully blur the line between strength and evil. For centuries, this move has been sustaining predatory states and keeping their leaders in power. The picture is usually much simpler, though. If one commits crimes, he is a criminal, and sometimes it’s all we need to understand.

Growing up in a family of “dissenters,” Oleh never dreamt of a political career. Rather than spend decades waiting for a Communist Party mandate and, to him, dubious privileges it could have granted, he chose to become a military interpreter.

In 1975, thanks to his brilliant knowledge of English and the goodwill of his examiner, Oleh enrolled in the Romano-Germanic faculty of Taras Shevchenko National University.

It was one of the most prestigious educational institutions in Ukraine, open mostly for wealthy and powerful ‘nomenklatura,’ closely linked to communist authorities. Together with other students, exclusively sons of Communist Party officials, KGB officers, and ‘red directors,’ he entered a completely new reality, learning about market economies and listening to forbidden BBC radio broadcasts.

Little did he know that his university circle would lead him to the Kremlin.

In 1992, after years of working at the Kyiv customs office and in India as an interpreter for the Ministry of Coal Industry, Oleh got a position at the National Bank. There, he formed a strong bond with its head, Viktor Yushchenko. Following Yushchenko into government, parliament, and the presidential administration, Oleh unexpectedly entered politics himself in 2002 as a deputy in the Our Ukraine bloc, and began engaging with Russian officials.

2004 became a major setback for Russia and for Vladimir Putin personally. Moscow had hoped power in Ukraine would pass to its preferred candidate, Viktor Yanukovych, keeping the country within Russia’s sphere of influence. Instead, allegations of election fraud sparked mass protests led by opposition candidate Viktor Yushchenko, culminating in the Orange Revolution and the eventual rise of a pro-Western government.

Months before the protests, Russia faced a clash between the top national security institutions, which were trying to convince Putin to work with either the Yanukovych or the Yushchenko party.

This is when Oleh’s former university classmate, who joined the KGB after graduation, introduced him to the heads of the security service of Gazprom and NTV, Russia’s leading TV channel.

Shortly after, Oleh started flying to Moscow regularly to meet different people from Putin’s orbit, including his sports coaches, classmates, and oligarchs. For the following month and a half, they tried to portray him as a different, new leader and a “nice bloke” who didn’t want to rule forever. On leisurely strolls and over hearty dinners, these people tried their best to impress Oleh and erase any idea of President Putin being “a monster and a KGBist.”

In 2005, when protests succeeded and Yushchenko came to power, Russia offered to sell Ukraine cheap gas via the intermediary company RosUkrEnergo. At first, Oleh discussed the issue with Dmitriy Medvedev, then the head of Putin’s presidential administration.

It was something Oleh still cannot forget.

Contrary to the advice of ‘old’ Ukrainian politicians, he refused a pompous arrival and flew to meet Medvedev on a commercial flight. At the airport, Oleh was stunned by a delegation of FSB veterans waiting to lead him to an armored car. They told him that Vladimir Putin, as a former head of Russia’s Security Service, ‘valued’ them and considered Security Workers’ Day on December 20, also dubbed ‘Chekist Day,’ one of the most important holidays of the year. As the car moved along Moscow streets, the FSB officers made Oleh an outrageous proposal. They offered to establish a cutting-edge intelligence center in Ukraine in exchange for infiltrating their person into President Yushchenko’s office.

“I still don’t get what they were counting on,” Oleh said. “But this episode says a lot about the way they see us. They think they can treat us like this — like some barbarians.”

In October 2005, Oleh got invited to the Kremlin, where he expected additional pressure.

As he was strolling through Red Square a few hours before his evening flight home, Dmitriy Medvedev called Oleh out of the blue to say that Putin was expecting him in two hours at the Kremlin. Unlike visits by any Russian politicians to Ukraine, when they were surrounded by a buzzing swarm of Ukrainian oligarchs competing for their attention, this invitation came through an informal phone call. What Russian elites expected from Ukraine was full obedience.

When Oleh arrived, Medvedev led him through the Kremlin’s dark corridors, full of guards. On their way past Putin’s study, he discovered that the room once belonged to Joseph Stalin.

Finally, the two entered what Oleh called a “tea room.” The tea, indeed, was steaming on a little table surrounded by three armchairs. Right after everyone took their seats, Medvedev became another silent piece of furniture, while Putin turned to Oleh and asked:

“Selling your motherland, aren’t you?”

That was a blatant verbal attack, something that a former KGB agent would do to pull the rug out from under your feet. Luckily, Oleh quickly figured out that Putin meant Kryvorizhstal, one of the largest steel plants in Ukraine. Re-privatizing the state company was one of Yushchenko’s election pledges.

“Yes, I am, but it’ll be very expensive,” Oleh replied immediately, keeping his composure.

At some point, they were laughing about Viktor Yanukovych. The conversation went smoothly, and Putin looked fairly laid-back until Oleh tried to explain what launched the Orange Revolution.

Closely watching the protests on the Maidan, Putin witnessed his first defeat in Ukraine — the one he had no power to avert. At the height of the revolution, in December 2004, he urged the Ukrainian president to use force and crack down on the protesters. Leonid Kuchma flatly refused, saying he would never, even if he could.

Oleh remembers the scene well:

“As soon as I began telling [Putin] the truth, his facial expression changed completely. He grabbed my arm… and said, ‘Oleh, stop it, I can see you’re a smart lad. I know who was funding it all, where the money was coming from, how much, and who Soros and Americans paid. That’s it!’”

The meeting ended with Putin’s ultimatum: if Ukraine didn’t sign the RosUkrEnergo agreement, Russia would cut off its gas supplies.

Evidently trained to ‘read’ people, the president of Russia also knows how to pressure and manipulate them. As Oleh watched him go from his relaxed, approachable self to angry and demanding in the blink of an eye, the impression Putin worked so hard to create fell apart.

Oleh thinks his remarks about the Orange Revolution might have ruined the day, but Putin’s failure to understand what democracy was has saved Ukraine. His decisions to occupy Crimea in 2014, invade Donbas, and launch a full-scale war in 2022 stem from his expectations that guns always win and democracy can be bought and sold.

“He can’t grasp — he hates — and he is afraid of what today’s Ukraine is,” Oleh summarized.

Putin, with his extensive background in the security service, zero democratic elections on the record, and a habit of following Stalin’s footsteps on the way to his desk, surely is a creation of the world’s largest authoritarian system. On the other hand, this “little grey man,” Oleh says, can proudly call modern Russia, constantly dwelling on its Soviet past and making up enemies to defeat, his own brainchild.

Still, what was born during Putin’s reign won’t necessarily die with him.

“We mustn’t deceive ourselves into believing that after Putin’s death, Russia will change... 70 percent of Russian officials have close ties to the KGB, FSB, and oligarchs. This is not democratic state material,” Oleh believes. “Russia can only be stopped by force.”

In his opinion, Russia’s collapse is inevitable, but the West shouldn’t be afraid of it — the debris of Russia will not be as deadly for Europe as the debris of Shahed drones is now for Ukraine.

Kateryna Antonenko contributed to the reporting.

Interested in topics about Russian politics? Take a deep dive into some of our related coverage.

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Scoop: Trump envoy’s conflict of interest: a Russia-linked business partner

NEWS OF THE DAY:

By Oleksandra Poda

Good morning to readers; Kyiv remains in Ukrainian hands.

205 UKRAINIAN POWS AND 528 BODIES OF FALLEN DEFENDERS RETURN HOME: On May 15, Russia and Ukraine swapped 205 prisoners of war each, as part of the three-day ceasefire agreement brokered by Trump. The released service members range in age from 21 to 62 and include soldiers, sergeants, and officers from the Ground Forces, Navy, Air Assault Forces, and defenders of Mariupol, Azovstal, and multiple front-line regions. Separately, Ukraine’s General Staff confirmed the return of 528 bodies of fallen defenders as part of repatriation measures. The remains will undergo expert examination and identification.

Zelenskyy thanked the US and UAE for their mediation.

Ukraine has recovered approximately 18,500 bodies of its service members since February 24, 2022.

RUSSIAN MISSILES THAT KILLED 24 IN KYIV CONTAINED WESTERN COMPONENTS: Ukrainian sanctions commissioner Vladyslav Vlasiuk said fragments of Russian Kh-101 cruise missiles used in the May 14 strike on Kyiv, which killed 24 people including three children, revealed that the weapons were manufactured in 2026 with Western-made components.

According to Ukrainian officials, the missiles contained parts from major U.S. and European companies.

RUSSIAN INTELLIGENCE HAS COORDINATES AND SATELLITE IMAGES OF KYIV’S POLITICAL AND MILITARY SITES: Ukrainian intelligence obtained documents detailing Russian plans for new strikes on almost 2 dozen Ukraine’s decision-making centers. The materials included coordinates and satellite images of political and military sites in Kyiv, including the President’s Office and the state residence in Koncha Zaspa.

ZELENSKYY: RUSSIA MAY ATTACK UKRAINE OR NATO FROM BELARUS: On May 15, Zelenskyy said that Ukraine has obtained intel that Russian officials and Lukashenko held meetings, which aimed to persuade the Belarusian leader to support Russian operations militarily. According to Zelenskyy, Russia is considering attacking NATO territory or potentially Ukraine in the Chernihiv-Kyiv direction from Belarusian territory.

On Wednesday, Lukashenko announced new rotational mobilization of certain military units and military training protocols for the Belarusian military, the move was intended to “prepare them for war”. Zelenskyy instructed Ukrainian forces to strengthen forces in the north of the country near Belarus. Poland and the Baltic states of Lithuania and Latvia, all sharing borders with Belarus, are particularly at risk. Both Lithuania and Latvia have reinforced their frontiers in response.

CAT OF CONFLICT:

Bibchik the cat cheers for Ukraine at the Eurovision Song Contest.

Stay safe out there.

Best,
Oleksandra

Russia launched one of the longest and most massive air attacks since the start of its full-scale invasion just days after the recent ceasefire expired.

Over the course of 30 hours, Russia launched more than 1,500 drones at Ukrainian cities, along with over 50 ballistic and cruise missiles, Zelenskyy said.

Read more

KYIV, Ukraine — Her phone was blinking nonstop from incoming messages. Friends and colleagues were sending Myroslava the same TikTok video with her face and personal information, accusing her of crimes for being part of the Territorial Conscription Centers that lead mobilization for the military draft in Ukraine.

The comment section was full of phrases like “shoot her” and “send her to the front line.” Myroslava was being accused of justifying the beatings of civilians by military recruiters.

“I’m made out to be a monster, like I’m a criminal against my own people…They even posted my full name, mentioned articles of the criminal code they say I should be charged under,” said Myroslava Liashuk, head of the Communications Group of Vinnytsia Territorial Conscription Center (TCC) and Social Support in central-western Ukraine.

A screenshot from a TikTok video with accusations against Myroslava, saying that she “justified the beating and abduction of civilians,” “the TCC’s attacks on civilians,” “the abduction of a blogger and his political persecution,” hitting 384,000 views.

Myroslava’s story is not an isolated case, and is an example of an unresolved conflict that has long been brewing in society between civilians and the military.

Recruiters who serve at the Territorial Conscription Centers, of which there are more than 200 main centers across the country, have to meet mobilization quotas to compensate for fallen soldiers and to be able to carry out rotations on the front lines. This is where a vicious cycle starts. The TCCs, whose work is poorly monitored, can sometimes exceed their authority and aggressively round up civilians who are evading military service. Since 2022, nearly 12,000 complaints regarding violations of human rights during mobilization have been submitted to the human rights commissioner of the Rada, which in turn undermines society’s motivation to serve.

The tension recently escalated to a number of violent attacks from both sides, one of which resulted in a territorial recruiter who was stabbed to death by a civilian. Such tensions reveal the fragile state of polarized Ukrainian society, which is at a crossroads between fear of mobilization and the risk of losing its independence.

Zelenskyy long avoided commenting on the situation with the TCCs and the struggle to sufficiently mobilize Ukrainians. The Counteroffensive reached out to the president for comment,s but at the time of publication, he has not responded.

The president has recently announced reforms in mobilization, such as increasing salaries and clearer terms of service, aimed at easing tensions. The timeline, though, remains uncertain.

“Right now, a lot of men are hiding. As unfortunate as it is to admit, in 2022–2023, those who wanted to [join the army voluntarily] already did that,” said Myroslava Liashuk.

Myroslava has been serving in the military for 17 years. She first got involved in the field during her university years, starting out as a cadet. She had a quite simple motivation. In school, Myroslava was bullied by her classmates. She had always wanted to learn how to stand up for herself.

When she saw female students wearing uniforms with stars on their shoulders at Kharkiv Air Force University, her mind sparked with realization: this was her chance to gain strength.

In 2009, she signed a contract with the Armed Forces.

“My mother thought I’d last maybe two months — that I’d call home begging, ‘please, take me away from here.’” recalled Myroslava.

In 2016, she encountered the harsh realities of war when she joined the Kharkiv-based 92nd Brigade. She fought there against Russian forces in the trenches, often without rotations for up to ten months. The hardest part was spending holidays on the front line because Russians liked to ‘greet’ Ukrainians at the front on special occasions. That’s why New Year’s nights were always marked by the heaviest shelling, Myroslava said.

But when the full-scale war started in 2022, Myroslava found herself facing a personal dilemma, choosing between devoting herself to her newborn child and to continuing to serve on the front line. She settled on a middle ground: taking her son to kindergarten, attending morning briefings, setting daily tasks, and monitoring incoming reports and news.

Last summer, she became the head of communications at the Vinnytsia local territorial recruitment center and also served as part of the mobilization notification group, accompanying military recruiters to go out and mobilize civilians.

“At that time, notification groups mainly operated at checkpoints. Vehicles were stopped and checks were conducted,” she recalled.

After Ukraine introduced martial law in February 2022 and general mobilization for men 25–60 years old, TCCs played a key role in upholding this system. TCC offices are modernized versions of old military enlistment offices that keep records, process recruits, and organize deployment, handling around 90 percent of mobilization tasks today.

The conscription process begins with receiving a draft notice, which is delivered in person, primarily by military recruiters, who may approach individuals at home, at work, or in public places, including checkpoints, often alongside police officers. Notices can also come as a letter via the postal office.

The notice specifies the date and time when the person liable for military service must appear at their local TCC. From there, next steps will be determined — either updating personal records such as marital status and place of residence or undergoing a military medical examination to determine fitness for military service.

The need for recruitment is quite clear: soldiers who are still serving without defined service terms need to be replaced, at least for rotations. Over the past six months, Ukraine has been meeting its minimum mobilization targets, though with “great difficulty.” The Ministry of Defense says nearly two million men are evading military service.

The personnel shortage is felt most acutely by soldiers who have been on the front line for a long time.

“For infantry it’s almost universally common for them to spend a month on position at a time,” said John*, a foreign military volunteer whose name was changed for security purposes. His unit has not undergone rotation since October 2025 — over seven months already. “Those units with poor management suffer some of the worst manpower shortages,” said John.

Isolated reports and public discussions about the abuse of power and misconduct in the mobilization process had already started emerging in 2022 and 2023. However, in April and May, 2026, a few cases involving TCC members became especially infamous.

In late April, in Odesa, TCC personnel were reported to have forcibly pushed people into official minibusses and, in one case, demanded a man pay $30,000 or they send him to the frontline.

The next day, the State Bureau of Investigation announced allegations of TCC servicemen torturing civilians, leaving one with a gunshot wound.

Although the pre-trial investigation is still ongoing and other individuals involved are being identified, the offenders are already facing serious charges, with penalties of up to 10 years in prison.

There are financial scandals, too. Earlier in May, police carried out searches at territorial recruitment centers in 16 regions, investigating alleged illicit enrichment totaling more than 92 million hryvnias (about 2 million USD).

“TCC is, in a certain way, a force-based structure; they felt their power over the people who were brought in… There was a certain sense of impunity within the TCC at that time,” said Oleksii, who is working at a medical commission examining people’s health for military service (his full name is withheld for security reasons).

Moreover, there were complaints by Ukrainian brigades that newly mobilized soldiers sometimes have poor health conditions and are unfit for service.

Oleksii said that TCCs could bring “those struggling with drug addiction, alcohol intoxication, or serious illnesses such as HIV or tuberculosis” for the military medical commission.

“There was a case when TCCs were sprayed with pepper spray. Some people were brought in after serious fights in the street. So both the TССs and the civilians would arrive beaten up, and the person often needed additional medical help because they were not fit to go through the medical commission,” Oleksii said.

The Counteroffensive could not verify those claims independently. However, there has been an unprecedented rise of civilian violence against military recruiters recently.

In April, a 56-year-old man stabbed a recruitment officer in the abdomen in Kharkiv. The injured officer was hospitalized, and the attacker was detained three hours later. The suspect faces up to 12 years in prison.

In the same month, in the Rivne region of northwestern Ukraine, during a document check, a man opened fire with an automatic weapon on servicemen and a police officer.

On May 9, a civilian man in Lviv discharged pepper spray, then seized a young girl who happened to be passing by and held a knife to her throat merely at the sight of TCC servicemen who had not approached him.

The next day, in the Odesa region in southern Ukraine, a man attacked a notification patrol group, inflicting multiple knife wounds while being escorted to a Territorial Recruitment Center.

“There are [always] videos, recorded by a civilian on a mobile phone. Not even the full picture of what happened, just a fragment. And usually, everyone sees only the moment when a clash has already started. No one sees how the situation actually began,” said Myroslava, reflecting on accusations of TCC abuse.

Myroslava noted that under the procedure for conducting mobilization notification, police officers who are carrying weapons are required to be present, while recruitment officers are not allowed to carry weapons themselves, and are instead provided with body cameras.

According to Myroslava, when unlawful actions are committed by a TCC service member or when the requirements of the military statutes are violated, offenders are held accountable through disciplinary proceedings.

In January 2026, in the district where Myroslava serves, a TCC member was implicated in corruption.

“She allegedly demanded a bribe in exchange for arranging compensation payments to the family of a fallen soldier. An official investigation was launched, she was suspended from her position, and further investigative actions are currently underway,” said Myroslava.

On the flip side, Russia actively takes advantage of gaps in the Ukrainian system in its information warfare, aiming to fuel internal divisions among Ukrainians. Staged or AI-generated videos are also being spread via anonymous Telegram channels and TikTok pages to disrupt mobilization efforts, aiming to weaponize fear and deepen the crisis.

“It all shapes public perception. People are paying attention, and many are already afraid,” said Myroslava.

Earlier this month, Zelenskyy announced plans to raise soldiers’ salaries, implement specific service time limits, and regulate mobilization procedures.

However, there are concerns about whether Ukrainian institutions can address the growing backlog of problems without dragging the process out for months, which already happened with the previous reform. Mobilization problems can quickly become toxic’ for one’s political image, which is why parties do not want to take personal responsibility for resolving them.

Today, according to Oleksii, recruitment offices are largely staffed by soldiers who have already served on the front line or have combat experience.

This shift has also changed the approach: staff, having served themselves, now tend to communicate more clearly, explain procedures such as medical commissions, and emphasize that candidates are not sent directly to the front line. People are also more often given the opportunity to choose the brigade they join.

“Time has changed, people have run out. No one wants to go [to the frontline],” said Myroslava.

NEWS OF THE DAY:

By Kateryna Antonenko

Good morning to readers; Kyiv remains in Ukrainian hands.

FORMER HEAD OF PRESIDENTIAL OFFICE CHARGED WITH CORRUPTION: The National Anti-Corruption Bureau (NABU) and the Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office (SAPO) have officially charged Andrii Yermak with laundering 460 million UAH through luxury construction projects near Kyiv. The charges follow a series of investigative actions, including a search of his residence on November 28, 2025. Shortly after, on January 2, President Zelenskyy dismissed Yermak from his position as Head of the President’s Office. There are, six more suspects whose names are still unknown. The participants laundered money through the construction of a cottage town near Kyiv in the village of Kozyn.

ZELENSKY ANNOUNCED UKRAINE WILL GET €90 BILLION IN JUNE: This money will be used to purchase and produce weapons, pay social assistance, and prepare the energy sector for the winter, according to Zelensky. Back in March 2026, Hungary and Slovakia blocked this aid.

NEGOTIATIONS UNDERWAY TO EXCHANGE POW 1000 FOR 1000: The list was formed in accordance with the period that the prisoners have been in captivity, with the longest-kept gaining priority. U.S. acts as a mediator in the negotiation process. Russia proposed to include children in the lists, which Ukraine did not accept. Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andriy Sybiga commented that the freedom of children is unconditional, so their inclusion in the exchange lists, as proposed by Moscow, is absolutely impossible. Since the full-scale invasion on February 24, 2022, Russia has abducted and forcibly deported more than 20,500 children from the occupied territories.

END OF THREE-DAY CEASEFIRE: Russia ended the temporary ceasefire, which lasted from May 8 to 11, by launching more than 200 drones at civilian infrastructure. The “ceasefire” didn’t hold across the whole country — on the front, strikes continued. President Zelensky noted that Ukraine had fulfilled the conditions of the ceasefire and refrained from long-range strikes deep into Russia; he also added that in the future, Ukraine would respond in kind.

DOG OF THE WAR:

A cute dog waits while its owner orders a coffee at a Kyiv coffee shop.

Stay safe out there.

Best,
Anastasiia

KYIV, Ukraine — Four homes. A baby boy kicks his little legs for the first time, standing with support. A girl builds yet another tower from her blocks. Elsewhere, a six-year-old girl creates a LEGO cat — only for the real cat, Kompot, to later see it as a rival. In the last one, a girl quietly draws another picture.

This is how children of mothers working for The Counteroffensive spend their days, like any other child , they are endlessly curious about the world around them. They ask why the sky is blue, why people need to work, why the sun disappears at night and why people argue.

Yet nothing prepares you as a mother to explain a war to your child.

Mother’s Day, celebrated on May 10, is an international holiday, usually filled with bouquets of flowers, warm sunlight, children’s handmade cards, and cheerful local events. It is a day meant to highlight care, gratitude, and the quiet strength of mothers everywhere.

Motherhood itself has always come with challenges and social judgments. Mothers are often told how to behave, as if there is only one correct way to be a ‘good mother.’ But in Ukraine, these long-standing pressures are intensified by the realities of war. The ongoing violence adds new layers of fear and responsibility, testing Ukrainian mothers every single day in ways that go far beyond ordinary expectations.

Nastia, mom of a 2-year-old daughter

The first hard question I faced during the war was when my two-year-old daughter started asking about the winter blackouts: “Mom, where is the light?”

I was puzzled and could only come up with a clumsy explanation. “It was taken by a man… but it will come back soon. Don’t worry, we will turn on our flashlights.”

“Why did they take the light?”

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Things are not going well for Russia’s 72 hour special military operation.

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