Ukraine-Russia war latest: Four dead in strikes across Ukraine as Zelensky warns Putin is ‘escalating every day’

At least four people have died across Ukraine during the latest wave of Russian aerial attacks, Ukrainian officials said on Saturday.

Two women were killed in Zaporizhzhia city when they were trapped beneath the rubble of their destroyed home, while a separate attack on Sumy also killed two people. Another two were injured in the Kyiv region after a Russian drone strike led to a fire at a warehouse.

Russian drones also hit several districts in the Ukrainian capital itself, injuring four and damaging residential and office buildings, Kyiv officials said.

Volodymyr Zelensky said the overnight strikes, which came at the end of a week of high-level diplomacy at the UN, showed the urgent need for the international community to rein in Vladimir Putin.

“It is essential that our partners not forget: Russia is escalating every single day. If the Russians have chosen to make their strikes even more brutal, the world must choose stronger responses to keep the war from spreading further,” he said.

Earlier, Putin said all proposals for a settlement to the war in Ukraine remain "on the table," but warned Kyiv to prepare for a sustained wave of what he called retaliatory strikes.

Four dead in Russian strikes across Ukraine

Russian attacks killed four people across Ukraine on Saturday, officials said, as the aerial war between Moscow and Kyiv intensified.

Russia has hammered Ukraine with cruise and ballistic missiles, powerful glide bombs and jet-powered drones in recent weeks while front line progress has slowed.

Two women in Zaporizhzhia died when they were trapped beneath the rubble of their destroyed home, Zaporizhzhia’s regional military administration said. A separate Russian attack on the city of Sumy also killed two people, local officials said.

Elsewhere in Ukraine, two people were injured in the Kyiv region overnight after a Russian drone attack caused a fire at a warehouse in the Boryspil district. Russian drones also hit several districts in the Ukrainian capital itself, injuring four and damaging residential and office buildings, officials said.

Russia's defence ministry said on Saturday that its attack on Kyiv had damaged a data centre that supported both cellphone internet services and Starlink satellite communication systems.

Putin discusses energy cooperation with Serbian president

Russian president Vladimir Putin discussed the Ukraine war and energy cooperation with Serbian president Aleksandar Vucic during a phone call, the Kremlin said on Saturday.

Vucic has described Serbia as “neutral” when it comes to the Ukraine conflict. The country has long held close relations with Russia but has also supported UN resolutions condemning Putin’s aggression.

Three killed in Ukrainian attack on Krasnodar region, says Russia

Three people were killed and two injured in a Ukrainian drone attack on Russia's Krasnodar region, local authorities there have said.

A local task force said fires at industrial sites that had broken out as a result of the attack had been extinguished.

Zelensky says he got Trump's OK for Patriot licences

The Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelensky says Donald Trump confirmed this week that he had made a final decision to allow Kyiv to get licences to produce Patriot air defence systems.

Ukraine is desperate for more of the American-made air defence systems that are needed to stop Russia’s ballistic missiles, but they have been in short supply since the war in Iran started on 28 February.

Trump had said in July that he would allow Ukraine to make its own Patriots but later appeared to be reconsidering the move.

Zelensky urges Trump to get China to help end Russia's invasion

Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky says he asked Donald Trump to press China’s Xi Jinping to use Beijing’s influence over Moscow and end the war on his country.

Zelensky told reporters late on Friday that he has not yet received feedback from the White House about Trump’s talks with Xi, but expects to learn the outcome.

Nato countries have called China a “decisive enabler” of Russian president Vladimir Putin’s invasion.

Zelensky was also in the US this week on a trip coinciding with the UN General Assembly. He met with Trump on Tuesday.

Zelensky met with US senators and Congress members during his trip and said he thanked them for their bipartisan support in passing a powerful sanctions bill aimed at Moscow last month. Trump signed the bill into law last week but hasn’t enacted the measures yet.

Inside the real war games as Europe readies for an attack by Russia

As warnings increase about a Russian attack on a Nato country, real-world war-games, whether played out around a conference table or on the ground as military exercises, are happening all the time. But the real danger is the potential for hysteria, fear and miscalculation to turn a shadow war into something much worse, writes Owen Matthews.

Little movement on Ukraine peace after turbulent week of UN diplomacy

The UN General Assembly concluded on Friday after a week of speeches, meetings and hallway diplomacy.

While they reached no breakthroughs on the world's most intractable conflicts, talks on the Iran and Ukraine wars inched forward.

US secretary of state Marco Rubio held talks with Russia's foreign minister Sergei Lavrov, after which he said Ukraine and Russia had both voiced an interest in a limited ceasefire involving grain and energy-related targets.

Ukraine and its allies are racing to secure these limited agreements before winter, fearing renewed Russian strikes on power and heating facilities.

But hours after Rubio spoke on Wednesday, Lavrov addressed the Security Council meeting on Ukraine, showing no indication Russia was prepared to engage on any subject. "Europe, whatever it thinks, just wants to get a pause, and it wants to use it to pump the Kyiv regime with weapons," Lavrov said.

UN refugee chief urges Security Council to do more to end wars

The UN’s refugee chief used his first speech at the Security Council yesterday to call for a renewed focus on ending conflicts and crises, so that more than 117 million people forced to flee their homes can return and don’t spend generations displaced in a foreign country.

The Ukraine war was just one of the conflicts cited by Barham Salih, who told the Council’s 15 members that they have “a unique responsibility to help make peace possible.”

He said the conflict started by Vladimir Putin’s invasion in 2022 had displaced millions inside the country and sent millions more fleeing to other countries.

Drone hits Russia's Ilsky oil refinery

Ukrainian drones reportedly targeted the Ilsky oil refinery in Russia's Krasnodar Krai, causing a fire at the facility.

Local governor Veniamin Kondratiev said that the Ukrainian drones targeted Seversky district, which houses one of the largest oil-processing facilities in southern Russia.

The extent of the damage to the refinery and casualties were not immediately known.

Government warned Homes for Ukraine funding cut may ‘send wrong message to Putin’

Planned government cuts to the Homes for Ukraine Scheme could “send the wrong message to Putin” by giving the impression that Western support for Kyiv is faltering, a Conservative former defence secretary has warned.

Starting from 1 January, monthly "thank-you" payments for households hosting Ukrainian refugees are set to drop from £350 to £100.

Local authority funding to support the initiative will also be scaled back on the same date, falling from £5,900 per guest to £3,300 per arrival.