Russia says it captured two more Ukrainian villages; Kyiv disputes report

MOSCOW - Russian troops have taken control of one village in Ukraine’s northeastern Kharkiv region and another in the southeastern Zaporizhzhia region, Russia’s Defense Ministry said on Wednesday.

Ukraine’s military and the country’s most widely read military blog cast doubt on the Russian announcement.

Russia’s Defense Ministry said its forces had taken control of Hraniv in Kharkiv region on the border with Russia and Vozdvyzhivka in a highly contested part of Zaporizhzhia region.

Ukraine’s 14th Army dismissed the Russian report, saying Hraniv was under the control of the Ukrainian military.

“Units of the Defense Forces of Ukraine are reliably holding designated defensive lines, effectively repelling enemy offensive actions, and inflicting significant losses on them in personnel and equipment,” it said on Facebook.

DeepState, a Ukrainian war blog that tracks the two sides along the 1,250-km (775-mile) front line using open sources, said the Russian report of Vozdvyzhivka’s capture was untrue.

It said a group of Russian servicemen had briefly entered the village earlier this month but had been evicted or killed.

On Tuesday, the 14th Army also denied the capture of one of two villages the Russian military claimed to have seized in the Sumy region, a border area where Moscow says it wants to expand a buffer zone.

Russia, which holds about 20% of Ukraine’s territory, has been engaged in a long campaign to secure control over all of the eastern Donetsk region, announcing the capture of villages each week.

But Ukraine’s military has said in recent weeks that Russian advances had slowed and its military was in the strongest position it had been in many months.

Zelenskyy asks Trump for air defense

President Volodymyr Zelenskyy urged U.S. President Donald Trump to help Ukraine with air defense systems and interceptors as Russia threatens new strikes, saying that ballistic missiles remain Moscow’s “last major advantage on the battlefield.”

In a letter to Trump and the U.S. Congress, seen by Reuters, Zelenskyy said: “I ask for your help in protecting Ukraine’s skies from Russian missiles. We have already proposed that Ukraine is ready to purchase the number of Patriot systems and interceptor missiles we need.”

Ukraine’s only means to shoot down Russian ballistic missiles is U.S.-made interceptors for the Patriot air defense system. Throughout four years of war, Kyiv has been short of interceptors, but the Iran war has threatened to make resources even more scarce.

Since Trump took office, Ukraine has been purchasing Patriot missiles through NATO’s Prioritized Ukraine Requirements List (PURL) initiative, financed by its European allies.

“But the current pace of deliveries through the PURL program is no longer keeping up with the reality of the threat we face,” Zelenskyy said in his letter.

“For us - for a nation fighting for its survival - there is hardly anything more painful to see than Patriot batteries with no missiles loaded,” he added.

Speaking in his nightly video address, Zelenskyy noted it was rare for a foreign leader to address a letter simultaneously to the U.S. president and Congress, “but the current situation requires action, swift and effective action. It is important that America hears Ukraine.”

Zelenskyy said ensuring Ukraine’s protection from Russian ballistic missiles was critical to negotiating peace.

“The sooner we can provide greater protection against ballistic missiles, the faster we can ensure that diplomacy works,” he said. “As long as Russia relies on missiles, its interest in diplomacy is not genuine. We must correct this and we can only correct it together, with America.”

The letter was first reported by Ukrainian media outlet The Kyiv Independent.

Russia used 30 ballistic missiles against Ukraine in its latest massive strike on Sunday, and only 11 of them were shot down, according to Ukraine’s air force.

Zelenskyy also said Moscow’s troops launched two nuclear-capable intermediate-range ballistic Oreshnik missiles for that strike.

“One struck the Kyiv region, while another, reportedly, fell in temporarily occupied territory in Ukraine’s Donetsk region.”

In the letter, the Ukrainian leader outlined Ukraine’s success in fending off Russia’s full-scale aggression, now well into its fifth year, and expressed gratitude for U.S. support.

“But as long as Putin still has even one meaningful advantage in conventional weapons, he will avoid conventional diplomacy. Today, his ballistic missiles remain exactly that - his last major advantage on the battlefield,” Zelenskyy added.

Russian Black Sea port tackles fire after drone strike

A fire broke out at Russia’s Black Sea port of Tuapse after another Ukrainian drone attack overnight, as authorities continue to clear up damage to the coastline following multiple strikes in recent weeks.

The blaze at a marine terminal in the Tuapse district of Krasnodar region began after drone debris fell on the facility, the regional task force said Wednesday on Telegram. More than 80 people and 25 pieces of equipment, including Emergency Ministry units, were involved in putting out the conflagration, it said, without elaborating further.

Ukraine is intensifying strikes on Russian energy infrastructure in an effort to curb the Kremlin’s revenues amid higher oil prices linked to the Iran war. Tuapse has been targeted multiple times since early April, forcing Russia to declare a regional emergency in the city of more than 60,000 people that’s home to one of the country’s largest Black Sea ports and a refinery owned by Rosneft PJSC.

Cleanup operations in Tuapse following an oil spill caused by earlier drone attacks are still going on, local authorities said. As of May 26, more than 113,700 cubic feet of contaminated soil and oil-water mixture had been collected and removed.

Separately, Ukraine launched a massive drone attack overnight on Enerhodar, the town that hosts the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant, with more than 50 explosions recorded, the occupied plant’s spokeswoman, Yevgenia Yashina, told Russia’s Interfax newswire on Wednesday. Parts of Enerhodar, in Russian-occupied southeastern Ukraine, lost power and communications were severely disrupted, she said.

Ukraine hasn’t commented on the Enerhodar strike allegations so far.

Overall, Russia faced 140 drones overnight across multiple regions, the Defense Ministry said. Several regions, including Voronezh which borders Ukraine, reported missile alerts. Voronezh Governor Alexander Gusev said air defenses detected and destroyed two high-speed aerial targets over the city early Wednesday, and falling debris damaged a tire repair shop and a utility cabin.

Crimea, which Russia annexed in 2014, also faced attacks overnight, including with more than 20 drones targeting the port city of Sevastopol, according to the Moscow-appointed Governor Mikhail Razvozhaev.

Russia launched 163 drones on Ukraine overnight, including Shahed attack drones, decoy drones and jet-powered UAVs, Ukraine’s Air Force said Wednesday.

Bloomberg News contributed to this report.

Copyright Reuters or USA Today Network via Reuters Connect.