Combating
Dozens of patients had to be evacuated from a hospital in northern Ukraine after a Russian bomb damaged equipment and smashed windows. The hospital in the northeastern Ukrainian town of Velykyi Burluk was directly hit by a bomb, according to Volodymyr Tymoshko, the chief of the national police’s Kharkiv regional branch, and another explosive detonated close by. There were four minor injuries.
14 of the 20 Russian drones that were shot down by Ukraine’s air defenses during an overnight raid that resulted in one person being hurt and commercial buildings being destroyed. According to the air force, five areas of Ukraine in the east and south were attacked by three Iskander missiles and Shahed drones manufactured in Iran.
Moscow claimed to have shot down twenty missiles fired by Ukraine over the Black Sea and the Crimean peninsula, which it had seized and annexed in 2014.
According to Mykola Oleshchuk, head of the Ukrainian air force, their forces attacked the Belbek military base in Crimea. He omitted any specifics.
Diplomacy and politics
Hundreds of prisoners of war were swapped between Russia and Ukraine. While Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy announced that 207 persons, including some civilians, had been released to Ukraine, Russia’s Defense Ministry reported that 195 of their soldiers had been liberated.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz declared before his nation’s legislature that he would mobilize fellow Europeans to provide Ukraine with a level of assistance that was “so huge” that it would affect Russian President Vladimir Putin. His remarks preceded a crucial conference of the European Union over 50 billion euros ($54 billion) in funding for Ukraine, which Hungary is obstructing.
During her visit to Kyiv, acting US deputy secretary of state Victoria Nuland expressed her encouragement at Ukraine’s bolstering defenses and warned Moscow to expect some “surprises” on the battlefield. Republicans in Congress are stalling a US military aid deal for Ukraine because they want to tie it to changes in border policies. Nuland expressed her confidence that it will be approved.
