events

Here are the key events from day 1,322 of Russia’s war on Ukraine.

Here is how things stand on Wednesday, October 8, 2025:

Fighting

• Russian President Vladimir Putin said his forces have captured almost 5,000 square kilometres (1,930sq miles) of Ukrainian territory so far this year, and Moscow retains the strategic initiative on the battlefield.
• Russian troops have captured the Ukrainian villages of Novovasylivka in the southeastern Zaporizhia region and Fedorivka in the eastern Donetsk region, Russia’s defence ministry said.
• Russian air defence units destroyed 184 Ukrainian drones in recent attacks, the RIA Novosti state-owned news agency reports.
• Russia’s air defence units also intercepted and destroyed a drone flying towards Moscow city, said Sergei Sobyanin, mayor of the Russian capital.

• Ukraine’s Energy Minister Svitlana Hrynchuk said Russian air strikes have caused “significant” damage to Ukrainian gas production capacity due to the targeting of regional gas infrastructure and power transmission facilities in front-line regions.
• Hrynchuk said Ukraine wants to increase imports of natural gas by 30 percent after Russian attacks on its gas infrastructure, telling reporters she had discussed additional gas imports with Group of Seven (G7) member states.
• Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy accused Russia of using oil tankers for intelligence gathering and sabotage operations, and he added that Ukraine was cooperating with its allies on the matter.
• Russia’s state nuclear energy company has claimed that a Ukrainian drone attempted to strike a nuclear plant in Russia’s Voronezh region bordering Ukraine, but the unmanned aerial vehicle crashed into a cooling tower and caused no damage at the site.

Military aid

• Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said Russia was waiting for clarity from the United States about the possible supply of Tomahawk missiles to Ukraine, saying such weapons could theoretically carry nuclear warheads and reiterated that Moscow would see the provision of such weapons as a serious escalation.
• The Kremlin also said it assumed for now that US President Donald Trump still sought a peace settlement in Ukraine.

Peace talks

• Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan spoke by phone with President Putin and said diplomatic initiatives need to gain momentum to achieve a just and lasting peace in the Russia-Ukraine war, Erdogan’s office said.
• The statement cited Erdogan as saying Turkiye will continue to work for peace and said bilateral relations and regional and global issues were also discussed with Putin.
• Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni said she believed Trump had come to the conclusion that Russia was not interested in a peace deal with Ukraine, and that the only way forward was to apply pressure, continue to support Ukraine, and impose sanctions on Russia.

Politics and diplomacy

• Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said it is not in Poland’s interest to hand over a Ukrainian man wanted by Germany for suspected involvement in explosions which damaged the Nord Stream gas pipelines three years ago.
• Tusk said the problem with Nord Stream 2 was not that it was blown up but that it was built. He added that Russia built the pipelines “against the vital interests not only of our countries, but of all of Europe”.
• A Polish court ruled on Monday that the Ukrainian diver wanted by Germany over his alleged involvement in the explosions, which damaged the Nord Stream gas pipeline, must remain in custody for another 40 days, his lawyer said.
• European Union governments have agreed to impose limits on the travel of Russian diplomats within the bloc, the Financial Times reported.

Economy

• Ukraine’s foreign currency reserves totalled $46.5bn as of October 1, the National Bank of Ukraine reported on its website.

Here are the key events from day 1,320 of Russia’s war on Ukraine.

Here is how things stand on Monday, October 6, 2025:

Fighting

• A Russian attack killed a family of four, including a 15-year-old girl, in the village of Lapaivka in Ukraine’s Lviv region, the regional prosecutor’s office reported in a post on Facebook.
• The attack on the region in Ukraine’s west, far from the Russian border, also injured several people and targeted gas infrastructure used for heating during a cold snap, the regional administrator’s office wrote in a post on Telegram.
• One person was killed and 10 others injured as Russian forces launched 702 attacks on 18 settlements in Ukraine’s Zaporizhia region in a day, Regional Governor Ivan Fedorov wrote on Telegram.
• The attacks left at least 73,000 people without power, with service restored to most people by early afternoon, Fedorov added.
• Russia’s Ministry of Defence claimed on Sunday its forces had hit Ukrainian military-industrial facilities as well as gas and energy infrastructure overnight.
• Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy wrote in a post on Facebook that Russian forces launched more than 50 missiles and about 500 attack drones at Ukraine overnight into Sunday, targeting the Lviv, Ivano-Frankivsk, Zaporizhia, Chernihiv, Sumy, Kharkiv, Kherson, Odesa and Kirovohrad regions.
• Ukrainian attacks on Russia’s Belgorod region left some 40,000 people without power, Regional Governor Vyacheslav Gladkov wrote in a post on Telegram.
• Three people were also injured in Ukrainian attacks on Belgorod, Russia’s TASS state news agency reported.
• Russian forces shot down four Ukrainian guided aerial bombs and 145 drones in a 24-hour period, TASS reported.

Politics and Diplomacy

• In response to a question from reporters about Russian President Vladimir Putin’s offer last month to voluntarily maintain limits on deployed strategic nuclear weapons, United States President Donald Trump said, “Sounds like a good idea to me.”
• German Defence Minister Boris Pistorius warned Europe must be wary of falling into “Putin’s escalation trap” while also strengthening anti-drone defences, amid drone sightings near airports across Europe.
• Georgian Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze said that “specific people from abroad … expressed direct support … for the announced attempt to overthrow [Moldova’s] constitutional order,” naming the European Union ambassador to Georgia, the day after protesters sought to force their way into the presidential palace.
• German Chancellor Friedrich Merz informed Trump about plans to use frozen Russian assets to support Ukrainian armed forces in a phone call on Sunday.
• The Reuters news agency reported that Trump administration diplomats are planning to accuse Cuba of providing up to 5,000 fighters to support Moscow’s war on Ukraine, in a bid to limit support for lifting the decades-long US embargo on Cuba. Cuban authorities previously arrested 17 people on charges related to a human trafficking ring that allegedly lured young Cuban men to fight in Ukraine with the Russian military.

Weapons

• Putin said that if the US supplies Tomahawk missiles to Ukraine for long-range strikes deep into Russia, it would “lead to the destruction of our relations, or at least the positive trends that have emerged in these relations”, in a video released by Russian state television reporter, Pavel Zarubin, on Sunday.
• In a post on X, Zelenskyy said that Russian weapons used to attack Ukraine include components made by companies from many places, including “the United States, China, Taiwan, the United Kingdom, Germany, Switzerland, Japan, the Republic of Korea, and the Netherlands”.

Here are the key events from day 1,319 of Russia’s war on Ukraine.

Here is how things stand on Sunday, October 5, 2025:

Fighting

• One person was killed and about 30 others injured after two Russian drones struck trains at a station in Ukraine’s northern Sumy region. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy accused Russia of “terrorism”, while Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha said Moscow deliberately targeted civilians during the attack.

• French photojournalist Antoni Lallican was killed, while his Ukrainian colleague Hryhory Ivanchenko was injured after a Russian drone attack struck the town of Druzhkivka in the Donbas region, one of the front lines of the three-and-a-half-year war, the Ukrainian military said.

• Russia has launched its most significant attack on Ukraine’s main gas production facilities in Kharkiv and Poltava regions, launching 35 missiles and 60 drones, according to Naftogaz CEO Sergii Koretskyi. The attack came as Ukraine prepares for a new heating season.

Regional security

• Danish Defence Intelligence Service director, Thomas Ahrenkiel, has accused Russia of risking unintended escalation, with its warships repeatedly sailing on collision courses with Danish naval vessels, aiming weapons and disrupting navigation systems in Denmark’s straits that connect the Baltic Sea to the North Sea.
• Germany’s Bild newspaper is reporting that drones have been spotted at airports and military installations across Germany over two days. The second drone sighting in two days has forced dozens of flights to be diverted or cancelled at Munich airport, although operations have resumed with delays by Saturday morning.

Politics and diplomacy

• International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Director General Rafael Grossi has called on Russia and Ukraine to show the “political will” required to keep the area around the Russian-held Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant safe to allow the external power line to be reconnected to the facility. The facility has been cut off from external power since September 23, making it more complicated to cool the reactors, while compromising nuclear safety.

• A senior Ukrainian intelligence official has accused China of passing on satellite intelligence to Russia to enable Moscow to better launch missile strikes inside Ukraine. Ukraine’s Foreign Intelligence Agency official Oleh Alexandrov told the state Ukrinform news agency that “there is evidence of high-level cooperation” between Moscow and Beijing in conducting satellite reconnaissance.
• The International Civil Aviation Organization has rebuked Russia for disturbances to critical satellite navigation systems that they say violate international rules, as the United Nations aviation agency’s assembly concluded in Canada. Estonia and Finland have accused Russia of jamming GPS navigation devices in the region’s airspace, charges that Moscow has denied.

The normally surf-themed bar at the Hyatt Regency Huntington Beach Resort and Spa has transformed into Pete’s Spookeasy for the month of October with Halloween-themed decor, food and drinks. Order mains such as Pasta from the Black Lagoon, with squid ink spaghetti, sautéed shrimp, lobster cream sauce, roasted tomato, asparagus and micro parsley, plus starters including “Bugs” in Stinky Cheese with whipped goat cheese, dates, marzipan “grubs,” figs, hot honey, micro thyme and crackers. Seasonal cocktails include Hex on the Beach, with rum, pineapple juice, orange juice, coconut and nutmeg, and BooBerry Margarita, with tequila, fresh blackberries, lemon and lime juice, agave and a black salt rim.

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Here are the key events on day 1,317 of Russia’s war on Ukraine.

Here is how things stand on Friday, October 3, 2025:

Fighting

• Russian President Vladimir Putin warned Ukraine it was playing a dangerous game by striking near the Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant and suggested Moscow could retaliate against nuclear plants controlled by Ukraine.
• The plant, Europe’s largest nuclear power facility, has been cut off from external power sources for more than a week and is being cooled by emergency diesel generators, which were not designed for lengthy operations.
• As both Ukraine and Russia blame each other for cutting off the external power at Zaporizhzhia and shelling the area, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha said Russia deliberately cut the external power as it was preparing to connect the station to its own grid.
• Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Svyrydenko said power had been fully restored in two areas of the border Sumy region hit by overnight Russian attacks. Repairs to power were also proceeding in the neighbouring Chernihiv region, where more than 300,000 consumers had been left without electricity after Russian strikes on Wednesday.
• The Trump administration’s desire to send long-range Tomahawk missiles to Ukraine may not be viable because current inventories are committed to the United States Navy and other uses, a US official and three sources have told the Reuters news agency.
• President Putin warned any decision by the US to supply the missiles to Ukraine would trigger a major new escalation with Washington, but would not change the situation on the battlefield.
• Ukraine and Russia have exchanged 185 service personnel and 20 civilians in the latest prisoner swap.

Regional security

• Speaking at the Valdai Discussion Club in Sochi, southern Russia, Putin said Moscow would carry out a nuclear test if another nuclear power did so after saying that he had seen signs a country, which he did not name, was preparing to conduct tests.
• Putin repeated his offer to the US of voluntarily rolling over an agreement capping the number of nuclear warheads in Russia’s arsenal when a key arms control treaty expires next year, if Washington agrees to do the same.

• Putin said Moscow never had any issues with Sweden or Finland and that their decision to join the NATO military alliance was therefore “stupid”.
• France’s detention of a tanker vessel suspected of operating for Russia’s “shadow fleet” is part of a new European strategy to block revenue funding Moscow’s war effort in Ukraine, President Emmanuel Macron said.
• The Kremlin said France’s boarding of the tanker was “hysteria” that could create problems for global energy transportation routes, while Putin condemned it as an act of piracy.
• Putin said the global economy would suffer without Russian oil, warning that prices would jump to more than $100 per barrel if its supplies were cut off.

Politics and diplomacy

• German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said he saw great agreement among European leaders on supporting the use of frozen Russian assets to provide loans for Ukraine – to be repaid eventually using war reparations from Moscow – adding that he expects a concrete decision on the matter within three weeks.
• Russia said the European Union’s idea was “delusional” and would prompt it to retaliate very harshly.
• Maxim Kruglov, the deputy leader of Russia’s liberal Yabloko party, which opposes the war in Ukraine, has been charged with spreading lies about the Russian army and could face up to 10 years in jail if found guilty.
• Kruglov’s lawyer said her client had been charged over two posts he had made on the Telegram messaging app: One post referred to UN data about the number of people killed in the port city of Mariupol in eastern Ukraine, which Russia took control of in May 2022, and another to events in Bucha, a town north of Kyiv, in March 2022.
• Voters in the Czech Republic are likely to oust their centre-right government in an election on Friday and Saturday, with polls favouring populist billionaire Andrej Babis to return to power on pledges to raise wages and lift growth while reducing aid for Ukraine.

Here are the key events on day 1,315 of Russia’s war on Ukraine.

Here is how things stand on Wednesday, October 1 :

Fighting

• Russian forces claim to have captured a village near the city of Siversk in Ukraine’s Donetsk region, the Russian Ministry of Defence said on Tuesday.
• The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) is engaging with Russia and Ukraine to restore offsite power to Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, as Russian shelling has prevented restoration of power needed to cool nuclear reactors and prevent a meltdown, IAEA chief Rafael Grossi said.
• Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that Russia’s shelling around the Zaporizhzhia plant “is a threat to everyone”.
• “No terrorist in the world has ever dared to do with a nuclear power plant what Russia is doing now,” Zelenskyy said in his nightly address on Tuesday.

Regional security

• European Union leaders will discuss proposals for a “drone wall” at a summit on Wednesday in Copenhagen, following days of airspace intrusions by unidentified unmanned aircraft that forced temporary closures at Danish airports.
• The “drone wall” summit will also be the first opportunity for leaders of the EU’s 27 countries to debate a proposal to use Russian assets frozen in European banks to fund a loan of 140 billion euros ( $164.37bn) for Ukraine.
• The Kremlin said that Germany has long been indirectly involved in the war in Ukraine after German Chancellor Friedrich Merz stated that Europe is “no longer at peace” with Russia.
• Moscow also said that Europe would be better off seeking dialogue with Russia about security issues rather than looking to build a divisive “drone wall”.
• Romania is looking to quickly set up production on its territory of a plant to build defensive drones, along with Ukraine, for use domestically as well as by EU and NATO allies, the country’s foreign minister, Oana Toiu, said.
• The French Navy said that authorities were investigating a possible sanctions infraction by the oil tanker Boracay, a vessel suspected of belonging to the so-called “shadow fleet” involved in the transport of Russian oil.

Military aid

• Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs Sergey Lavrov said that Moscow did not believe that Washington had taken a final decision on supplying Tomahawk cruise missiles to Ukraine.

Politics and diplomacy

• The Kremlin said that there were many people living in Ukraine’s Odesa and Mykolaiv regions who wanted to “link their fate to Russia” but were afraid to speak out.
• Russia will expel an Austrian diplomat, according to Russian state news agencies, in response to Vienna’s decision to throw out a Russian diplomat over suspicions of relaying company secrets from Austrian oil company OMV to the Kremlin.
• US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said that India is starting to diversify its oil purchases away from Russia, and that the EU is trying to strengthen economic ties with India.
• Russia’s Lavrov said that he believed Moldova’s election on Sunday had been openly manipulated, as the pro-European governing party won a resounding victory over its Russian-leaning rival in the key parliamentary election.

Here are the key events on day 1,313 of Russia’s war on Ukraine.

Here is how things stand on Monday, September 29:

Fighting

• Russian forces killed four people, including a 12-year-old girl, and injured 13 in an attack on Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, on Sunday night, Tymur Tkachenko, the head of Kyiv’s military administration, wrote in a post on Telegram. Those killed also included staff and patients at a cardiology centre, Tkachenko added.
• Polish news outlet RMF24, citing Polish Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Pawel Wronski, reported that Poland’s embassy in Kyiv was also damaged in the attack.
• Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy wrote on X that Russian bombardment also targeted the regions of Zaporizhia, Khmelnytskyi, Sumy, Mykolaiv, Chernihiv and Odesa, wounding at least 40 people across the country.
• The Russian assault led to military responses in neighbouring Poland, where fighter jets were deployed early on Sunday as Russia struck targets in western Ukraine, according to the Polish army.
• Russia fired a total of 595 exploding drones and decoys, and 48 missiles, of which Ukrainian forces shot down or jammed 566 drones and 45 missiles, Ukraine’s air force said on Sunday.
• Russia’s Ministry of Defence claimed that forces targeted the “military-industrial complex of Ukraine” with a “massive strike”, using “high-precision long-range air, sea-based weapons and unmanned aerial vehicles [drones]”.
• A civilian died in hospital after he was injured in a drone attack on the village of Novostroyevka-Pervaya, in Russia’s Belgorod region, Russia’s TASS news agency reported, citing Governor Vyacheslav Gladkov.
• Russian forces shot down 230 Ukrainian drones, six guided aerial bombs and six rockets in a 24-hour period, TASS reported, citing Russia’s Defence Ministry.

Regional security

• Zelenskyy said in his nightly address that “intelligence now indicates that the Russians are using tankers to launch and operate drones against European countries,” calling for Russian tankers, or at least their shadow fleet, to be banned from the Baltic Sea.
• Denmark’s military said on Sunday that the country was banning civilian drone flights, after drones were observed at several military facilities overnight, days after drone sightings caused the temporary closures of several Danish airports.

Politics and diplomacy

• Moldova’s governing pro-European Party of Action and Solidarity (PAS) was in the lead over the pro-Russian Patriotic Bloc, with 90 percent of votes counted in Sunday’s parliamentary election, the country’s electoral commission said.
• Pavel Durov, the Russian founder of the Telegram messaging app, accused French intelligence on Sunday of having asked him through an intermediary to censor some Moldovan voices in return for help with his court case in France.
• In a post in English on X, the French Ministry for Europe and Foreign Affairs noted that Durov had made similar accusations about France trying to manipulate politics in Romania earlier this year, around the time of elections there. “After Romania, Moldova. @durov likes making accusations while elections are ongoing,” the ministry wrote.

• Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told Russian state television that Zelenskyy’s recent threats – in which the Ukrainian president said that Kremlin officials should know “where the bomb shelters are” – were about “trying to demonstrate to the Europeans, who now act as the breadwinners, that he is such a brave soldier”, as Ukraine’s position at the front was “inexorably deteriorating”.

Here are the key events on day 1,312 of Russia’s war on Ukraine.

Here is how things stand on Sunday, September 28 :

Fighting

• Ukrainian long-range drones hit an oil pumping station in Russia’s Chuvashia region, causing a fire and forcing the suspension of operations, an official from the Ukrainian security service, the SBU, told the Reuters news agency.

• Russian forces had taken over three more villages in eastern Ukraine’s Donetsk and Dnipro regions, amid a grinding Russian advance in the area, Russia’s military said in a post on Telegram.

• Moscow and Kyiv have traded blame for attacks on the Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, which has forced the facility off the main power grid for the last four days.

Regional security

• NATO has announced that it is upgrading its mission in the Baltic Sea with an air-defence frigate and other military assets deployed to the region, after several days of unidentified drone sightings at airports in Denmark and military bases.

• Earlier, Latvia and Lithuania called on NATO to increase its military protection of the Baltic States, citing alleged Russian violations of the military alliance’s airspace.
• Norway has launched an investigation into “possible sightings of drones” near its biggest military base, Orland, where its advanced F-35 fighter jets are stationed, a military spokesman said.

Military aid

Politics and diplomacy

• Any aggression against Russia “will be met with a decisive response”, Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs Sergey Lavrov warned NATO and the European Union in his address at the UN General Assembly (UNGA) in New York on Saturday. He warned that Moscow is prepared to act if provoked.
• In separate remarks to journalists, Lavrov also suggested that Germany is returning to its Nazi past, in what was seen as a personal attack on German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, as his government moves to ramp up defence spending amid growing threats from Moscow.
• Russia has fallen short of the 93 votes necessary to get elected to the UN aviation agency’s governing council, in the latest rebuke following Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine. Russia received 87 votes during the agency’s assembly in Montreal.
• South Korean Minister of Foreign Affairs Cho Hyun met Lavrov in New York, where he expressed Seoul’s “grave concern” over military cooperation between Russia and North Korea. Thousands of North Korean troops have been sent to aid Russia in its war against Ukraine, and Pyongyang has bolstered Moscow with a huge transfer of weapons.

Here are the key events on day 1,311 of Russia’s war on Ukraine.

Here is how things stand on Saturday, September 27:

Fighting

• A Russian attack on Ukraine’s Kherson region killed a 74-year-old woman and injured two other people, Regional Governor Oleksandr Prokudin wrote in a post on Telegram. About 70 homes and an administration building were damaged in the attack, Prokudin said.
• Ukraine’s General Staff said Ukrainian forces struck Russia’s Afipsky oil refinery. “Confirmed collision and fire,” the General Staff said in a post on Facebook, adding that the degree of damage was being investigated.
• Russian forces have occupied the Ukrainian village of Yunakivka in the Sumy region, the Russian Ministry of Defence reported, according to Russia’s TASS news agency.

Politics and diplomacy

• Russia on Friday accused Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy of making “irresponsible” threats after he said Moscow’s top officials should check for bomb shelters near the Kremlin if the country does not stop its offensive on Ukraine.
• In an interview with United States media outlet Axios, published on Thursday, President Zelenskyy said Russian officials “have to know where their bomb shelters are”, adding: “If they will not stop the war, they will need it in any case.”
• US President Donald Trump told Zelenskyy he was open to lifting restrictions on Ukraine’s use of American-made long-range weapons to strike deep inside Russia, but did not commit to doing so in their meeting on Tuesday, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing unnamed officials.
• Axios also reported on Friday that Zelenskyy asked Trump for Tomahawk missiles, citing unnamed sources.

Regional security

• Zelenskyy said Ukraine’s military had recently “recorded violations of our airspace by reconnaissance drones, which are likely Hungarian”, along the country’s border with its neighbour. Speaking later in his nightly video address, Zelenskyy referred to “very strange incidents” and called for “thorough checks”.
• Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto replied in a post on X, saying: “President Zelenskyy is losing his mind to his anti-Hungarian obsession. He’s now starting to see things that aren’t there.”
• Earlier on Friday, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha said Kyiv had imposed an entry ban on three high-ranking Hungarian military officials, responding to an earlier entry ban imposed by Hungary on Ukrainian military officials.
• European Union Defence Commissioner Andrius Kubilius said EU defence ministers have agreed to develop a “drone wall” along their borders with Russia and Ukraine, amid increasing reports of Russian violations of EU airspace.

• Moldova’s electoral commission barred two pro-Russian parties from taking part in this Sunday’s parliamentary election, a high-stakes vote overshadowed by claims of Russian interference.
• Serbian police arrested two people on Friday, accusing them of running “combat-tactical training” for dozens of protesters in advance of tense Moldovan parliamentary elections this weekend.
• The arrests come after Moldova’s president, Maia Sandu, accused Russia of paying “hundreds of people” to destabilise the country before Sunday’s vote.

Energy

• Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko put forward plans to either expand his country’s only existing nuclear power plant or build a second plant in order to supply energy to Russian-occupied regions of Ukraine, during a meeting at the Kremlin with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday, according to Russia’s RIA Novosti news agency.
• Lukashenko also said after the meeting that he had reached an agreement for Russia to provide gas to Belarus for the next five years, RIA reported.
• Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, the exiled leader of Belarus’s opposition, told The Associated Press news agency that the energy plans put “all of Europe at risk” and “proves once again” that Lukashenko “is complicit in Russian aggression”.

Here are the key events on day 1,310 of Russia’s war on Ukraine.

Here is how things stand on Friday, September 26:

Fighting

• Ukrainian naval drones hit Russian ports in Novorossiysk and Tuapse on Wednesday, causing the temporary suspension of operations by Russia’s oil pipeline monopoly Transneft’s oil terminals at the sites, according to a Ukrainian intelligence source.
• A drone was downed and detonated approximately 800m (some 0.5 miles) from the perimeter of the South Ukraine Nuclear Power Plant in the Mykolaiv region after 22 Russian drones were observed in the vicinity of the plant, the International Atomic Energy Agency said.
• Russian state news agency TASS claimed that Ukraine attempted an attack on the Kursk Nuclear Power Plant in western Russia – one of the biggest nuclear plants in the country.
• Ukraine’s northern city of Chernihiv and surrounding districts are facing major power cuts after a Russian attack on critical infrastructure, affecting approximately 30,000 consumers, a local official said.

Regional security

• German Chancellor Friedrich Merz called for “effective deterrence” by NATO in response to repeated airspace violations by Russia and reiterated the military alliance’s commitment to use “all necessary military and non-military tools” to defend itself.
• NATO’s Secretary-General Mark Rutte has backed United States President Donald Trump’s comments this week that NATO member countries should shoot down Russian drones and planes if they enter their airspace.
• Romanian Defence Minister Ionut Mosteanu said European states must respond “firmly but proportionally” to provocations, such as having their national airspace violated, adding that Romania’s top defence council agreed on a clear chain of command response in case of airspace breaches by manned and unmanned aircraft.
• German defence conglomerate Rheinmetall plans to build a new ammunition plant in Latvia, expanding the capability of the Baltic nation bordering Russia to defend itself militarily as European countries race to increase their defence capabilities in the wake of Moscow’s war on Ukraine.

Politics and diplomacy

• Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said he would be ready to step down from his position when the war with Russia is over, he told the Axios news site.
• Trump said NATO’s relationship with the US was the strongest it has ever been, speaking from the White House on Thursday during a meeting with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
• Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban held a phone call with Trump to discuss energy security in Central Europe, as the prime minister explained to the US president that Hungary’s energy supply cannot be guaranteed without Russian gas and oil imports.

Peace talks

• Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that Moscow assumed the Trump administration still maintained the political will to find a solution to the war with Ukraine, and that Russia was ready to engage in peace negotiations.
• Peskov’s comment comes just days after Trump abruptly shifted his rhetoric and said he believed Kyiv could recapture all of its land taken by Russia.

Here is how things stand on Thursday, September 25 :

Fighting

• At least two people were killed by a daytime Ukrainian drone attack on the Russian city of Novorossiysk on Wednesday, according to The Moscow Times. Among those injured were employees of a Russian-Kazakh oil project.
• Russia’s Ministry of Defence on Wednesday said 1,495 Ukrainian troops were killed in the past 24 hours of fighting, according to Russia’s state news agency TASS. The numbers have not been independently verified.
• Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov dismissed concerns about Russian incursions into NATO airspace as unfounded “hysteria”, according to the AFP news agency.
• “We hear such exaggerated hysteria about our military pilots allegedly violating some rules and invading someone’s airspace,” Peskov said.

Politics and diplomacy

• Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy warned world leaders of the threat posed by Russian weapons and innovation while speaking to the United Nations General Assembly.
• “Stopping Russia now is cheaper than wondering who will be the first to create a simple drone carrying a nuclear warhead,” Zelenskyy said on Wednesday.
• The Ukrainian leader also warned of the threat posed by artificial intelligence in the weapons industry, which could be the “most destructive” arms race in human history.
• Ukraine and Syria formally restored diplomatic ties on the sidelines of the UN summit. Kyiv broke off ties in 2022 after Syria’s then-leader Bashar al-Assad recognised Russian-occupied Ukrainian territory as independent.
• Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov separately met with his United States counterpart Marco Rubio in New York on Wednesday. Rubio urged “Moscow to take meaningful steps towards a durable resolution”, while Lavrov accused Kyiv and Europe of “prolonging” the war.
• Kremlin spokesperson Peskov rejected a statement from US President Donald Trump that Russia is a “paper tiger” and said the country “maintains its macroeconomic stability”.

Economy

• Russia released its 2026 wartime budget on Wednesday, which included a proposal to raise its value-added tax (VAT) from 20 to 22 percent. This would draw in another $15.5bn in funds, according to The Moscow Times.
• VAT remains an important source of government revenue in Russia, the newspaper said, and approximately 40 percent of this year’s federal revenue will come from VAT.
• Moscow’s latest budget also came with the dire prediction that growth in 2025 will tap out at just 1 percent, down from 4.3 percent in 2024, according to the Reuters news agency.
• Russia’s economy is expected to grow just 0.5 percent in 2026, The Moscow Times said, while the federal deficit swelled to $61.1bn between January and July.

Here are the key events on day 1,308 of Russia’s war on Ukraine.

Here is how things stand on Wednesday, September 24:

Fighting

• Ukrainian drones attacked the Salavat petrochemical complex, controlled by energy giant Gazprom, in Russia’s Bashkortostan, causing a fire, regional Governor Radiy Khabirov said on Wednesday via his Telegram channel.
• Ukraine’s military struck two Russian oil distribution facilities in the Bryansk and Samara regions, as well as a military airfield in Russia-occupied Crimea, Kyiv’s general staff said on Telegram.
• The Russian Ministry of Defence said its troops hit bases of Ukrainian special forces and foreign mercenaries in retaliation for Ukraine’s strike on Crimea.
• Russian forces also took control of the village of Pereizne in the Donetsk region in eastern Ukraine, the Russian Defence Ministry said on Tuesday.
• Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant lost all off-site power on Tuesday for the 10th time, prompting the  Ministry of Energy to call for decisive international action to secure the removal of occupying Russian forces from the site to restore nuclear safety in the region.

Politics and diplomacy

• United States President Donald Trump said on Tuesday at the United Nations headquarters that Ukraine can win back all territory lost to Russia, a major change of stance from his previous calls for Kyiv to make land concessions.
• Trump also said the US would continue to supply weapons to NATO for the alliance “to do what they want with them”, posting on his Truth Social platform following a meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in New York.
• Zelenskyy said he was surprised by Trump’s comments made earlier in the day and said it was a very positive signal that the US would be with Ukraine until the end of the war.
• Zelenskyy added that the US leader could be a “game-changer” for Ukraine, as there was an understanding “that President Trump is ready to give Ukraine security guarantees after this war will finish”.
• The Ukrainian president also met the US special presidential envoy, Keith Kellogg, to discuss procurement of weapons from the US and mutually beneficial agreements on drones, according to Zelenskyy’s post on X.
• European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said Trump agreed on the need to quickly cut Russia’s revenues from fossil fuels – possibly by the end of the year, speaking to the US president on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly on Tuesday.

Regional security

• NATO issued a stern warning to Russia on Tuesday against what it called an “increasingly irresponsible” string of violations of its member states’ airspace, adding that it would employ “military and non-military” measures to defend itself.
• NATO said “our commitment to Article 5 is ironclad”, the provision in the alliance’s founding treaty that commits all member states to mutual defence in the event of an attack on any one of them.
• European Union foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said “every country has the right to defend itself and act accordingly” if Russian planes violate airspace.
• Michael Waltz, the new US envoy to the UN, emphasised the US and its allies will “defend every inch of NATO territory”. He was speaking at a UN Security Council meeting on Monday to discuss accusations of a Russian airspace violation.

Here are the key events on day 1,306 of Russia’s war on Ukraine.

Here is how things stand on Monday, September 22:

Fighting

• A Ukrainian drone attack killed three people and injured 16 near the town of Foros on the Crimean Peninsula, the Russian-appointed head of Crimea, Sergei Aksyonov, wrote in a post on Telegram.
• Russia’s Ministry of Defence said the attack occurred “using strike drones equipped with high-explosive payloads”, in a resort area “where there are no military targets whatsoever”.
• Two people were killed in a Ukrainian drone attack on a gas station in Pervomaisk, in Ukraine’s Luhansk region, occupied by Russia, the Russian Ministry of Emergency Situations for Luhansk said, according to Russia’s state news agency TASS.
• Anna Soroka, a Russian-appointed human rights commissioner for the Luhansk region, said that Ukraine was deliberately targeting gas stations during a period of fuel shortages, according to TASS.
• TASS also reported that one person was killed in a Ukrainian attack on Russia’s Belgorod region, and one person was killed and three people were critically injured in a Ukrainian drone attack on Vasylivka in Russian-occupied Zaporizhia.
• Ukraine’s General Staff said its forces attacked the Saratov Oil Refinery in Russia’s Saratov region on Saturday night, reportedly causing fires and explosions. Ukrainian forces also attacked the Novokuibyshevsk Oil Refinery in Samara, where the General Staff said “the results of the damage are being clarified”, in a statement shared on Facebook.

Regional security

• Germany’s air force said it scrambled two Eurofighter jets to track a Russian reconnaissance aircraft, which Germany said entered neutral airspace over the Baltic Sea.
• The incident comes after Estonia, Poland and Romania reported Russian fighter jets or drones entering their airspace in recent weeks.
• Estonia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said on Sunday that the United Nations Security Council will convene an emergency session on Monday “in response to Russia’s brazen violation of Estonian airspace”.
• Two officials told Reuters that a planned NATO North Atlantic Council meeting to respond to the violation of Estonia’s airspace would take place on Tuesday.
• Asked on Sunday whether he would help defend European Union countries if Russia intensified hostilities, United States President Donald Trump told reporters: “Yeah, I would. I would.”

Politics and diplomacy

• Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that his country is planning to meet with Trump this week, amid a “very intense week” of diplomacy during the UN General Assembly in New York, in a post on X.
• French President Emmanuel Macron said that European countries were complying with international law by using the proceeds from frozen Russian assets in European banks. But he added that seizing the assets from Russia’s central bank could cause “total chaos”, in response to a question from CBS news about recent comments made by Trump.
• Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova responded, saying: “If Moscow’s frozen assets are confiscated in Europe, there won’t be chaos, but rather very harsh countermeasures from Russia. And they know this,” Russia’s RIA Novosti agency reported.
• Russian Colonel General Alexander Lapin, a senior commander who served in the first phase of Russia’s war in Ukraine, has been dismissed from military service, Russian media outlet RBC reported on Sunday, citing an unidentified source.

Here are the key events on day 1,305 of Russia’s war on Ukraine.

Here is how things stand on Sunday, September 21:

Fighting

• Russian forces launched a large-scale missile and drone attack, targeting areas across Ukraine, killing at least three people and wounding dozens more, according to Ukrainian officials.
• Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Russia launched 580 drones and 40 missiles, and that the attacks took place across nine regions, including Dnipropetrovsk, Mykolaiv, Chernihiv, Zaporizhia, Poltava, Kyiv, Odesa, Sumy and Kharkiv.
• Ukrainian forces launched drone attacks on Russia’s southwestern Samara region, killing at least four people, according to Governor Vyacheslav Fedorishchev announced on social media. The region is located 800km (497 miles) from the front line in Ukraine.
• The Reuters news agency, citing Ukraine’s SBU security agency, said Ukrainian drones hit Russian oil pumping stations, which are part of the Kuibyshev-Tikhoretsk oil pipeline, in the Volgograd and Samara regions. The facilities that were targeted were involved in Russian oil exports via the Black Sea port of Novorossiysk, the report said.
• The Russian Ministry of Defence said its forces shot down 383 Ukrainian drones over the past day.
• The ministry also claimed control of the village of Berezove in Ukraine’s southeastern Dnipropetrovsk region.

Regional security

• Poland and its allies scrambled aircraft to ensure the safety of Polish airspace early on Saturday after Russia launched attacks on western Ukraine, the country’s armed forces announced.
• The move came after Poland shot down suspected Russian drones in its airspace earlier this month, and Estonia said three Russian military jets violated its airspace for 12 minutes on Friday.
• The United Kingdom also sent two fighter jets on their first NATO air defence sortie over Poland as part of the alliance’s Eastern Sentry mission, its government said.
• Lithuanian Minister of Defence Dovile Sakaliene has called on NATO to urgently move air defence capabilities to front-line states, saying citizens of NATO states are “being threatened almost every day now”.

Politics and diplomacy

• Ukraine’s Zelenskyy said that he would meet United States President Donald Trump on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly in New York next week to discuss security guarantees for his country and sanctions on Russia.
• Zelenskyy said he expects the US to impose a new round of strong sanctions against Russia, a day after the European Union also announced its 19th round of sanctions package on Moscow.
• Russia has intensified its use of criminal prosecution, long-term imprisonment, intimidation, torture and ill-treatment to silence opposition since its invasion of Ukraine, according to Mariana Katzarova, the UN special rapporteur on the rights situation in Russia. The report detailing a “seismic decline” of the human rights situation in Russia will be presented to the Human Rights Council on Monday.

Here are the key events on day 1,303 of Russia’s war on Ukraine.

Here is how things stand on Friday, September 19 :

Fighting

• Ukrainian drones hit a key oil-processing and petrochemical complex in Russia’s Bashkortostan region, as well as an oil refinery in the Volgograd region, as Ukraine escalates its campaign against Russia’s extensive oil and gas sector.
• Russian military units claim to have breached Ukraine’s western village of Yampol and secured new positions near five residential areas in the same area, according to Russia’s state TASS news agency.
• Russia’s Chief of the General Staff Valery Gerasimov has claimed Russia is gaining ground in “almost all directions” along the front lines with Ukraine.
• Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy insisted that Russian losses have mounted in the eastern city of Pokrovsk amid Ukraine’s “heroic defence” of the area.
• Latvian authorities identified debris from a Russian drone found on the Baltic coast, near the country’s port city of Ventspils. Latvia’s Defence Minister Andris Spruds wrote on X that the object was the tail end of a “decoy” Gerbera drone and confirmed it was not explosive.

Regional security

• The United States Department of State has approved the sale of Javelin missile systems to Poland for an estimated $780m. The deal would “support the foreign policy and national security of the United States by improving the security of a NATO ally”, the US Defense Security Cooperation Agency said.
• Ukraine has agreed to train Polish soldiers and engineers in drone warfare defence. The announcement came a week after Polish and NATO forces shot down more than 20 drones violating the country’s airspace during a Russian aerial attack on neighbouring Ukraine.
• The European Commission’s Defence Commissioner Andrius Kubilius said he plans to convene talks with defence ministers next week on creating a “drone wall” along the European Union’s eastern border, a concept that was already under discussion before the most recent incidents of Russian drone incursions in EU airspace.
• Ukrainian anti-drone technology, battle-tested against Russia, was on display at a Taiwanese defence expo this week.

Peace process

• US President Donald Trump said in a Fox News interview that he was “very disappointed” with Russian President Vladimir Putin over his failure to secure a peace deal in Ukraine.
• “The one I thought was going to be easiest [to settle] was going to be Russia-Ukraine, because of my relationship with President Putin. So I’m disappointed,” Trump said.
• In the same interview, Trump proclaimed the US would play a role in post-war peace-building in Ukraine. “After the war is settled, we would help secure the peace. And I think ultimately that’ll happen,” he said.
• Trump said in another joint news conference, after meeting with British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, that President Putin “has really let me down”.
• During the meeting, Trump and Starmer discussed ways to increase defence support for Ukraine and “decisively” put pressure on Putin to agree to a peace deal, Starmer said.
• Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov took a swipe at Trump in response, according to TASS: “When President Trump says he is disappointed, it seems to me – I can’t say that I know him very well, of course, but I have spoken with him several times, and I have formed a certain impression – that this is partly because he wants quick solutions”.

Politics and diplomacy

• President Zelenskyy said he had spoken with Qatari Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani and thanked him on X for “assistance in returning Ukrainian children abducted by Russia”. In another post, he thanked the United Kingdom’s King Charles for “steadfast support” after the king referenced Ukraine during a dinner with Trump on Wednesday.

I spoke with the Amir of Qatar, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani @TamimBinHamad.

I thanked him for his assistance in returning Ukrainian children abducted by Russia. We greatly value this solidarity and such sincere attention to our children.

I invited Qatar to take part in the…

— Volodymyr Zelenskyy / Володимир Зеленський (@ZelenskyyUa) September 18, 2025

Economy and energy

• Russia’s Ministry of Finance announced a new measure to help protect the state budget from oil price fluctuations and Western sanctions as Russian oil and gas sales for September are expected to see a 23 percent reduction compared with last year, the Reuters news agency reports.
• Putin suggested he was willing to raise taxes on the wealthy, such as imposing a luxury tax or higher taxes on stock dividends, to boost Russia’s wartime economy.

Sanctions

• The European Commission is slated to present its 19th package of sanctions against Russia to member states on Friday, which includes a proposal to ban Russian liquefied natural gas, an official said.
• Australia announced new sanctions against 95 “shadow fleet” Russian vessels, which are oil tankers used to evade Western sanctions. The government also lowered the price cap for Russian oil to $47.60 per barrel, down from $60 a barrel, following a similar move by the EU, the UK, Canada, New Zealand and Japan.

Long Beach resident Ashley Likins was pages away from finishing “Onyx Storm,” the third installment in Rebecca Yarros’ fantasy book series, when a long-haired black kitten hopped into her lap.

Given the foster name Soup Enhancements, the cat was one of the rescues boarding at Cool Cat Collective, a cat-themed boutique at the eastern end of Long Beach’s Fourth Street Corridor. The store, which offers all manner of cat-themed merchandise from kitty treats to cat-printed coasters, doubles as a shelter for cats rescued by TippedEars, a local trap-neuter-return, or TNR, nonprofit.

These resident kittens at Cool Cat Collective spend most of their time in a luxury “catio” in the back corner of the boutique, but twice a month, they are released to roam about during after-hours fundraising events. A popular silent reading party, co-hosted by reading club LB Bookworms, mimics a cat cafe, and according to the book club’s founder, Martha Esquivias, the event has sold out nearly every month since its debut last November.

Deb Escobar reads a book as foster kitten Poolboy creeps around her during a silent reading night at Cool Cat Collective.

It was during the silent reading event in early August that Likins sat, second-guessing the decision she’d made a few days prior to adopt Soup Enhancements. She adored the cat; still, she worried she’d been impulsive and wasn’t truly ready for the responsibility of pet ownership.

But as she watched the kitten nod off in her lap, she glimpsed the future in which the pair would do this routine a thousand times over with Likins devouring a book and the cat sleeping soundly below.

“I’m not just in a kitten craze,” Likins recalled thinking to herself. “This is my cat.”

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It’s that kind of moment Jena Carr, 39, had dreamed of when she and her husband, Matt, 40, opened Cool Cat Collective last year.

Former Washington, D.C., restaurateurs, the Carrs moved to Long Beach in 2022 to be closer to Jena Carr’s family. Once they settled in, Carr threw herself into kitten rescue, a longtime interest. She started as a foster owner and kitten rescue volunteer before assisting TippedEars with its work tracking and capturing cats in Compton.

“Once you start realizing the extent of the cat overpopulation problem, you quickly realize that we can’t foster or adopt our way out of it,” Carr said, calling TNR “the solution that gets to the root of the problem.”

One day during peak kitten season, Carr was out with TippedEars co-founder Renae Woith when she was struck by the number of sick and injured cats on the streets and the challenges of understaffed rescues working to home them.

“It kind of got her wheels working, like, ‘What can I do as a business?’” Woith said.

1

2

1. Foster kittens Bisque, Poolboy and Chauffeur play together during a silent reading night. 2. Foster kitten Sesame walks around a display in the store.

Almost a year later, Cool Cat Collective was born.

It was still warm outside on an early September evening as the last of the daytime visitors left the cat boutique. Once they were gone, Carr made her final touches for the night’s silent reading party: laying cushions in store corners and scattering toy mice across the floor.

In the catio, Poolboy, a domestic shorthair, licked a Churu treat from a visiting reader’s hand. When he and his siblings — all named after blue-collar jobs — arrived in late July, they were timid. But at this silent reading party, they bounded about the room, crawling on attendees’ laps between wrestling matches.

“It makes me so happy when the shy ones become social,” Carr said.

A sign hanging outside the catio tallied good news: 93 adoptions since July 2024. TippedEars co-founder Vita Manzoli said that’s about double the numbers the rescue used to see before the boutique opened.

TippedEars’ partnership with Cool Cat Collective has been a boon for the nonprofit, which receives 100% of the proceeds from the cat boutique’s “First Thursday” silent reading parties and “Third Thursday” doodle nights, which both cost $15 to attend. But it’s not only the financial support that has made a difference for TippedEars cats.

“We’ve gotten volunteers from them — donors, adopters, obviously, but the byproduct of that is really just educating people about the cat overpopulation crisis, what TNR is and how they can help,” Woith said.

Placing rescues at Cool Cat Collective, where they are comfortable and their personalities are on full display, has also allowed TippedEars to give them a better chance at being adopted.

“The cat they may not have looked twice at online, they now are the one [adopters are] taking home, because they actually got to meet them,” Woith said.

“This is a beautiful marrying of my interests,” silent reading party attendee Regan Rudman said of the event. “It also provides a great third space that we’re really missing nowadays.”

Carr has a spreadsheet of potential resident kittens always on her mind, so she’s eager to facilitate adoptions. But everyone is welcome at Cool Cat Collective, whether they’re looking to adopt or not.

“You don’t even have to be shopping,” Carr said. “That was part of our goal: to create a space with a really low barrier to access for people who are cat-curious or just need a little moment of cat joy in their day.”

Regan Rudman, a recent Long Beach transplant, can’t have a cat of her own for health reasons. Still, she visits Cool Cat Collective every month. She tried for three months to snag a ticket to the store’s silent reading night before she secured a spot for the September event.

“Getting to actually interact with cats in an environment that they feel comfortable in just makes my heart so happy,” Rudman said.

Rudman, who works at a publishing company, made an effort to focus on her book during the silent reading hour, but she also hoped her ruffled leg warmers would entice a curious kitten to come over.

“I think everyone is a little distracted by the cats,” said silent reading party attendee Mathilde Hernandez, who befriended foster cat Gumball.

Other attendees, lounging on cushions throughout the boutique, gazed down at their e-readers but peeked as cats bounced around like pinballs in their periphery.

Poolboy and sibling Chauffer, who would find their forever home together that weekend, were particularly rowdy. On the other hand, Bisque — from a litter Carr called “the Soups” — hid in a cardboard house for an hour before she finally stretched a paw out, like a jazz hand through the “front door.”

“There’s always some antic happening,” Carr said. “People are reading, but they also have one eye on the cats as they’re reading. I’d be curious asking people, like, how far into their book they actually get.”

Attendee Lien Nguyen, whose love for the kittens overrode her cat allergy, admitted she’d drop her book the second a cat came into her vicinity. But no matter how hard they tried, scarcely an attendee could successfully attract a kitten. The cats chose their company, not the other way around.

“Part of our goal was to create a space with a really low barrier to access for people who are cat-curious or, you know, just need a little moment of cat joy in their day,” said Jena Carr, co-founder of Cool Cat Collective.

“It was like rejection therapy whenever they went away,” Nguyen said.

That’s why Likins was so touched when Soup Enhancements found her at the August silent reading party. She nearly burst into tears, she said.

Later that evening, she was moved even more when her boyfriend, Max Mineer, bonded with his feline soulmate, Handyman. Happily, Handyman happened to be the only cat Soup Enhancements tolerated.

Now, the two cats live together in Likins and Mineer’s Long Beach apartment. They sleep together, clean each other and, despite being from different litters, generally behave like siblings.

The day Likins brought the cats home, staffers at Cool Cat Collective and TippedEars gave her every resource imaginable, including a 20% off coupon for Chewy products and scratch post recommendations. And there was an easy out: If anything went wrong, the couple could bring the cats back, no questions asked.

“It really made me trust them more to know that they were thinking to the future about these cats,” Likins said. “It wasn’t just a process of making sure that a cat got a home. It was making sure that a cat got a life.”

It features a new race in the Spanish capital Madrid. This is in addition to the event at Barcelona’s Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya, which has hosted the Spanish Grand Prix since 1991.

Barcelona’s contract runs out after next season but it is in the running to be one of the events that rotates with the Belgian Grand Prix, whose new contract sees it host races in four of the next six years.

Other events to have expressed an interest in rotating are Germany, Portugal and Turkey.

F1 is also working on finalising plans for a new race in Thailand’s capital Bangkok, perhaps from 2028.

There have been six sprints each year since 2023 and F1 has not increased that for 2026 because of the added strain on the teams as a consequence of the new chassis and engine regulations that are being introduced.

However, F1 bosses are considering increasing the number of sprint events from 2027 to as many as 12, which would mean sprints at half the races during the season.

A sprint event features a shorter race with its own qualifying session, before qualifying and the main event. A traditional grand prix weekend has three practice sessions before qualifying and the grand prix.

There are also discussions about modifying the format of sprint events, which could include trying out reverse grids.

F1 president Stefano Domenicali said: “With four competitive sessions rather than two during a conventional grand prix weekend, F1 sprint events offer more action each day for our fans, broadcast partners and for the promoters – driving increased attendance and viewership.”

Sprints also generate more income for the sport as promoters are prepared to pay a premium to host them.

Domenicali added: “The 2026 season will usher in a new era of regulations, so having three new sprint venues will only add to the drama on track.”

Here are the key events on day 1,300 of Russia’s war on Ukraine.

Here is how things stand on Tuesday, September 16 :

Fighting

• A Ukrainian drone attack killed two women in the village of Golovchino in Russia’s Belgorod region, Russia’s state TASS news agency reports.
• A man who was seriously injured in a Ukrainian drone attack in Russia’s Belgorod region in April has died in hospital, TASS reports.
• TASS also reported that Russian forces shot down 82 Ukrainian drones in a 24-hour period.
• Russian forces have captured the village of Olhivske in Ukraine’s Zaporizhia region, Russia’s Ministry of Defence said on Monday.
• Ukraine’s Air Force said it shot down 59 of 84 Russian drones fired overnight, while Russia also fired three guided missiles.
• The commander of Ukraine’s drone forces, Robert Brovdi, reported that a Starlink outage affected the entire front line for about 30 minutes, starting at 7:28am local time (04:28 GMT). Ukraine’s forces are heavily reliant on SpaceX’s Starlink terminals for battlefield communications and some drone operations.

Regional security

• Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said that Poland’s State Protection Service “neutralised a drone operating over government buildings” and the Presidential Palace. Police are investigating the drone incident, and two citizens of Belarus have been detained, Tusk added in a post on X.
• Announcing that the United Kingdom will deploy fighter jets to Poland, Prime Minister Keir Starmer said, “Russia’s reckless behaviour is a direct threat to European security and a violation of international law, which is why the UK will support NATO’s efforts to bolster its eastern flank.”
• The UK Foreign Office on Monday called the recent Russian drone incursions into Polish and Romanian airspace “utterly unacceptable”, and summoned Russian Ambassador Andrei Kelin.
• “Russia should understand that its continued aggression only strengthens the unity between NATO allies,” the Foreign Office said in a statement.

• Russia and Belarus continued their Zapad 2025 joint military drills on Monday, with Russia launching a Kalibr missile from a nuclear submarine in the Barents Sea, according to the Russian news agency Interfax.
• United States military officers observed the joint war games in Belarus, where they were told by Belarusian Minister of Defence Viktor Khrenin that they could look at “whatever is of interest for you”.
• Denmark’s defence minister attended a military exercise in Greenland on Monday with his Icelandic and Norwegian counterparts, the Danish Ministry of Defence said. The US did not send observers.
• Danish Minister of Defence Troels Lund Poulsen said in a statement: “The current security situation requires us to significantly strengthen the armed forces’ presence in the Arctic and North Atlantic.”

Tariffs and sanctions

• US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said on Monday that the administration of President Donald Trump would not impose additional tariffs on Chinese goods to halt China’s purchases of Russian oil unless European countries hit China and India with steep duties of their own.
• “We expect the Europeans to do their share now, and we are not moving forward without the Europeans,” Bessent said.
• Russia warned on Monday that it would go after any European state that sought to take its assets after reports that the European Union was looking for new ways to leverage hundreds of billions of dollars of frozen Russian assets to help Ukraine.

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez says Israel must face the same sporting sanctions as Russia did after the Ukraine war.

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez has urged international sporting bodies to ban Israel from competitions, saying its treatment should mirror Russia’s exclusion after the invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

Speaking to his Socialist Party on Monday, Sanchez said Israel’s participation in global events was incompatible with its assault on Gaza.

“The sports organisations should consider whether it’s ethical for Israel to keep participating in international competitions. Why expel Russia after the invasion of Ukraine and not expel Israel after the invasion of Gaza?” he asked. “Until the barbarity ends, neither Russia nor Israel should be in any international competition.”

His remarks came a day after pro-Palestinian activists disrupted the closing stage of the Vuelta a Espana cycling race in Madrid, throwing barriers onto the course in protest at the participation of the Israeli team Israel-Premier Tech. Police clashed with demonstrators near the finish line, leaving 22 people injured and arresting two.

Last week, Spanish Sports Minister Pilar Alegria said Israeli teams should be banned from sport in the same way that Russian sides broadly were in 2022 after the country invaded Ukraine, highlighting a “double standard”.

Israel’s Foreign Minister Gideon Saar lashed out at Sanchez, calling him an “anti-Semite and a liar”, without elaborating on why the criticism of Israel’s genocidal war in Gaza was anti-Semitic. Israel has been accused of weaponising anti-Semitism to target criticism of Israel’s policies against Palestinians.

Last year, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called the International Criminal Court anti-Semitic after the Hague-based court issued an arrest warrant against the Israeli prime minister and his former Defence Minister Yoav Gallant for war crimes.

Tensions between Madrid and Tel Aviv have sharpened in recent months, with Spain’s left-leaning coalition openly backing activists who staged demonstrations during several stages of the Vuelta against the Israeli team’s presence.

Weapons deal with Israel cancelled

Spain is also reportedly planning to scrap a major weapons deal with an Israeli defence manufacturer. According to official documents seen by AFP, Madrid cancelled a contract worth nearly 700 million euros ($824m) for rocket systems designed by Israeli firm Elbit Systems.

The deal, signed in October 2023, involved the purchase of Elbit’s PULS rocket launchers, known in Spain as SILAM. Its cancellation brings the total value of Israeli arms contracts annulled by Spain in recent months to nearly one billion euros ($1.2bn). A previous agreement in June, reportedly with defence company Rafael, was also halted.

Neither Elbit nor Rafael has formally commented, though the Israeli daily Haaretz, which also reported the cancellation, quoted a source as saying that no official notification of cancellation had yet been received. Neither government has confirmed the move publicly.

Al Jazeera, however, could not independently verify the reports.

Spanish media reported that Madrid is exploring ways to distance its defence industry from reliance on Israeli technology. La Vanguardia said officials are studying a plan with Spain’s main arms producers to replace the Israeli systems affected by the embargo.

Last week, Sanchez unveiled nine measures aimed at ramping up pressure on Israel, including banning docking and overflight rights for ships and planes carrying weapons to the country. The prime minister framed the steps as part of Spain’s responsibility to push for an end to what he described as Israel’s “barbarity” in Gaza.

Other steps include banning imports from Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank and Sanchez pledging 10 million euros ($11.8m) in new funding to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) and a total of 150 million euros ($176m) in humanitarian aid for Gaza by 2026.

Here are the key events on day 1,298 of Russia’s war on Ukraine.

Here is how things stand on Sunday, September 14:

Fighting

• Russian attacks on Ukraine killed at least three people in the Donetsk region and another in Kharkiv, the Kyiv Independent reported on Saturday, citing local officials.
• A drone breached Romanian airspace during a Russian attack on Ukrainian infrastructure, prompting Romania to scramble fighter jets, the country’s defence minister, Ionut Mosteanu, said. He added that the F-16 pilots came close to taking down the drone as it was flying very low before it left national airspace towards Ukraine.
• Poland also deployed aircraft and closed an airport in the eastern city of Lublin because of the threat of Russian drone strikes. The moves came three days after Poland shot down Russian drones in its airspace with the backing of aircraft from its NATO allies.
• On the front line, the Russian Ministry of Defence claimed its troops had taken control of the village of Novomykolaivka in Ukraine’s southeastern Dnipropetrovsk region.
• In Russia, a local official said two Ukrainian drones hit one of the country’s largest oil refining complexes in the Bashkortostan region, sparking a fire and causing minor damage. Regional Governor Radiy Khabirov said that despite the attack, operations would continue at the facility operated by Bashneft, a subsidiary of Russia’s largest oil producer, Rosneft.
• An explosive device detonated on a section of railway in Russia’s western Oryol region, killing two people and wounding another, Governor Andrei Klychkov wrote on Telegram. Russia’s railway network has been repeatedly rocked by derailments, blasts and fires that authorities blame on Ukrainian sabotage.
• The Russian Defence Ministry said its troops shot down 340 Ukrainian drones over the past day and also struck Ukrainian long-range drone infrastructure.

Politics and diplomacy

• United States President Donald Trump said the US is prepared to impose new energy sanctions on Russia, but only if all NATO nations stop buying Russian oil and implement similar measures.

• Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy also urged allies to stop buying Russian oil and not to “look for excuses” to avoid sanctions.

• US lawmakers Lindsey Graham and Brian Fitzpatrick, both Republicans, have sponsored a bill to impose tough sanctions on Russia over its war on Ukraine, and said they would urge fellow legislators this week to tie their bill to must-pass legislation on keeping the federal government operating. The measures include secondary sanctions on India and China for buying Russian oil.
• Chinese Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi criticised the US’s calls for action against buyers of Russian oil, saying that Beijing did not participate in wars or plot them. He said that war cannot solve problems and that sanctions only complicate them.
• Poland’s foreign minister, Radoslaw Sikorski, accused Hungary of blackmailing the European Union by obstructing Ukraine’s bid to join the 27-member bloc. Ukraine had applied to join the EU days after Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022, but has been unable to advance accession talks due to vetoes imposed by Hungary’s Kremlin-friendly leader, Viktor Orban.

• US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the incursion of Russian drones into Polish airspace this week was unacceptable but that it remained unclear if Russia had deliberately sent the drones into Polish territory. Poland had shot down the drones, the first known shots fired by a member of the Western alliance since the war began.

Military

• Ukraine will need at least $120bn for its defence in 2026 as the war with Russia drags on into its fourth year, Minister of Defence Denys Shmyhal said. Ukraine now spends more than 31 percent of its gross domestic product (GDP) on its military. This year’s state budget plans at least $63bn in defence spending, plus in-kind weapons from Kyiv’s Western allies.
• Russia’s MiG-31 fighter jets, equipped with hypersonic ballistic missiles, completed a four-hour flight over the neutral waters of the Barents Sea as part of ongoing “Zapad 2025” (West 2025) military exercises, the Interfax news agency reported. Russia and Belarus are holding joint drills days after Poland shot down suspected Russian drones over its airspace.

Economy

• Ukrainian officials and a team from the US International Development Finance Corporation will carry out site visits to identify investment projects as part of Kyiv’s minerals deal with Washington, Ukraine’s Minister of Economy Oleksii Sobolev said. The two countries had signed a deal giving the US preferential access to new Ukrainian minerals projects in exchange for investment.