A Russian drone hit a covered market in the eastern Ukrainian city of Nikopol yesterday, killing five people and wounding 19, officials said, as Moscow pressed on with intensified daytime attacks.

Russian forces repelled a drone attack early yesterday on part of the TurkStream gas pipeline that connects southern Russia and Turkey, the pipeline’s operator Gazprom said in a statement.

Russian air attacks across Ukraine early yesterday killed at least four people and damaged critical infrastructure, including a port and a maternity hospital, authorities said, as Russia’s pressed on with its war with Ukraine.

Russia fired almost 1,000 drones at Ukraine over the last 24-hours, unleashing one of its largest-ever daytime attacks, killing at least eight people and hitting the UNESCO-protected city centre of Lviv, officials said yesterday.

A Ukrainian drone attack in Russia’s southern Krasnodar region killed one person, its governor said yesterday.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said Monday that 11 countries had tapped Kyiv for help in how to counter Iranian drones being fired by Tehran in retaliation for US-Israeli strikes.

Bangladeshi men are being flown out of Dhaka, routed through Saudi Arabia and the UAE, before being taken to Moscow and forced onto the frontlines of Russia’s war in Ukraine.

More than 100 Bangladeshis have been recruited into Russia’s war against Ukraine, and dozens have been killed on the front lines, according to rights groups that say many of the men were misled, exploited, or financially trapped before ending up in combat.

Ukrainian missiles struck the Russian town of Belgorod near the border, inflicting serious damage on energy installations and disrupting power, water and heating, the regional governor said early yesterday.

Global consequences of a continental war

As the conflict reaches its four-year mark, AFP looks at the state of the conflict and some of the consequences for both countries

Ukraine's air force downs most projectiles, 13 targets hit

Ukraine’s NABU anti-corruption force said yesterday it arrested the country’s former energy minister German Galushchenko -- who resigned last year during a massive corruption scandal -- as he tried to cross Ukraine’s border.

A Ukrainian missile attack yesterday killed two people and injured three in the Russian city of Belgorod near the border, regional governor Vyacheslav Gladkov said.

Six people died in Russian strikes across Ukraine overnight that targeted the southern port city of Odesa and energy infrastructure, officials announced yesterday.

Russia pounded Ukraine with drones and ballistic missiles overnight yesterday, further battering its energy system and leaving tens of thousands in the capital Kyiv and the cities of Dnipro and Odesa without heat, power and water, officials said.

The United States wants Ukraine and Russia to end their nearly four-year war by June, and has offered to host talks between the two sides in Florida next week, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said.

Ukraine’s power grid experienced mass outages yesterday after a “technical malfunction” caused electrical lines between Moldova, Romania and Ukraine to fail, Ukraine’s energy minister said.

Ukraine is ready to reciprocate if Russia halts its attacks on the country’s energy infrastructure that has plunged the capital Kyiv into cold, President Volodymyr Zelensky said yesterday, adding there was no formal truce between the two countries.

Ukraine yesterday accused Russia of undermining negotiations to end their almost four-year war by launching fresh deadly strikes, as officials from both countries and the United States met for a second day of direct talks in Abu Dhabi.