Russia-Ukraine war – live: Putin bombing campaign causes emergency blackouts in 7 regions of Ukraine

A journalist on a reporting trip in a Ural Mountains city. A corporate security executive traveling to Moscow for a wedding. A dual national returning to her hometown in Tatarstan to visit her family.

All of them are U.S. citizens, and all are behind bars in Russia on charges of varying severity.

One civilian was killed and another was wounded in Russian shelling of the Kherson region on March 29, a Ukrainian commander revealed.

Oleksandr Prokudin, the head of the Kherson Regional Military Administration, said this in a post on Telegram.

“One person was killed and another was wounded as a result of Russian aggression,” said Prokudin.

According to him, over the last day Putin’s army fired at Bilozerka, Veletenske, Kizomys, Sadove, Beryslav, Zolota Balka, Novooleksandrivka, Shliakhove, Novovorontsovka, Osokorivka, Tiahyntsi, and Kherson.

A multi-storey building and two private houses were damaged.

In addition, a cell tower and a warehouse were hit.

The Kherson City Council added that the Russian shelling of the regional centre damaged two private houses and a multi-storey building.

Ukraine’s air force said on Saturday that Russia fired four missiles into eastern Ukraine overnight, as well as 12 Shahed drones across the country.

It said nine of the drones were shot down in four regions.

Russia has launched an air strike campaign on Ukraine’s energy infrastructure over the past week, causing significant damage in several regions.

Russia launched a huge attack on Ukraine’s energy infrastructure on Friday, with a barrage of 99 drones and missiles hitting regions across the country, Ukraine’s armed forces said.

Air raid warnings rang out across the nation, with 10 Ukrainian regions coming under fire, the country’s interior minister, Ihor Klymenko, said.

Russia has escalated its attacks on Ukraine in recent days, launching several missile barrages on the capital, Kyiv, and hitting energy infrastructure across the country in apparent retaliation for recent Ukrainian aerial attacks on the Russian border region of Belgorod. Such sporadic attacks, however, have been common throughout the war.

India‘s foreign minister held talks Friday with his Ukrainian counterpart, who was visiting to strengthen bilateral ties and cooperation with New Delhi, which considers Russia a historic ally from the Cold War-era.

Indian foreign minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar said in a post on the social media platform X that he and Dmytro Kuleba discussed “the ongoing conflict and its wider ramifications,” and said the two would work together to boost relations between their countries.

Hours before gunmen last week carried out the bloodiest attack in two decades in Russia, authorities made an addition to a government register of extremist and terrorist groups: They included the international LGBTQ+ “movement.”

That addition to the register followed a Russian Supreme Court court ruling last year that cracked down on gay and transgender people in the country.

Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelensky, related the conversation on Twitter and thanked Speaker Mike Johnson for his and the US’s “critical support of Ukraine since the start of Russia‘s full-scale invasion”. He also described briefing the Speaker on an uptick in Russian missile, bombing and drone attacks in the weeks since funding for Ukraine’s defence has stalled in Congress.

A $10 billion battle over more than 200 jets stuck in Russia should be heard in London rather than Moscow, London’s High Court has ruled on Thursday.

The battle is between reinsurers and aircraft leasing companies seeking payouts.

Aircraft lessors, including Ireland’s AerCap and US-listed Carlyle Aviation Partners, are pursuing insurers for losses after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine grounded their jets in Russia.

Russia fired drones and missiles overnight at southern and eastern regions of Ukraine, authorities said, injuring more than a dozen people as the Kremlin’s forces persevered with attritional attacks designed to wear down Ukrainian defenses.

Ukrainian MP Kira Rudik has asked her country’s allies to switch from “helping Ukraine fight, to letting us win the war.”

She said limitations on issues such as weapons delivery need to be lifted so Ukraine does not have to face Russia “empty-handed”.

The People’s Deputy of Ukraine also said she understands the strain many are facing under the cost of living crisis, and suggested donating around £50 billion of Russian money frozen in Britain to the Ukrainian war effort.

She said: “Let’s make Putin pay for what he broke.”