Russia and Ukraine exchanged heavy strikes on Friday, effectively collapsing a unilateral two-day cease-fire declared by Moscow to coincide with its World War II commemorations.
Ukraine did not agree to the pause, instead accusing Russian President Vladimir Putin of attempting to briefly quiet the battlefield in order to stage a high-profile Victory Day parade on Red Square.
Kyiv also said Moscow ignored its own earlier proposal for a short-term truce, which Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy framed as a test of whether the Kremlin was serious about de-escalation after four years of war.
Russia, meanwhile, has warned of a large-scale strike on Kyiv if Ukraine disrupts Saturday’s parade, repeatedly advising foreign diplomats to leave the capital ahead of the event.
“On the Russian side, there was not even a token attempt to cease fire on the front,” Zelenskyy said.
“As we did over the past 24 hours, Ukraine will respond in kind today as well,” Zelenskyy wrote on X.
Ukraine’s air force said Russia fired 67 drones overnight, the lowest number in almost a month.
Zelenskyy also reported hundreds of Russian attacks along the front line involving short-range drones and attempted assaults.
Russia’s Defense Ministry said it had downed 264 Ukrainian drones overnight and that its forces were “responding symmetrically.”
Zelenskyy also hailed a Ukrainian strike on an oil depot in the Yaroslavl region, about 200 kilometers (125 miles) northeast of Moscow.
Authorities in Russia said 13 airports in southern regions were temporarily closed Friday morning due to the threat of Ukrainian attacks.
Ukraine has dismissed Russia’s temporary truce as a propaganda effort aimed at securing calm for the May 9 Victory Day parade, one of the most significant patriotic events for Putin.
Hours before the cease-fire took effect, Zelenskyy warned countries allied with Russia against attending the parade.
“We have also received messages from some states close to Russia, saying that their representatives plan to be in Moscow. We do not recommend it,” Zelenskyy said.
“They want from Ukraine permission to hold their parade so that they can go out onto the square safely for one hour once a year, and then go on killing,” he added.
Russia has twice this week warned of a major strike on Kyiv if the Red Square parade, where Putin is expected to deliver a speech linking Soviet victory over Nazi Germany with his invasion of Ukraine, is attacked on Saturday.
“We remind the civilian population of Kyiv and staff at foreign diplomatic missions once again of the need to leave the city in good time,” Russia’s Defense Ministry said in a statement Thursday evening.
Zelenskyy will remain in Kyiv over the weekend, a senior source close to the Ukrainian president told the Associated Press on condition of anonymity.
The European Union, Britain and Germany were among the foreign missions in Kyiv that rejected and condemned the Russian threat.
Hundreds of thousands of soldiers from both sides and tens of thousands of civilians, most in Ukraine, have been killed since Russia’s invasion began in February 2022.
Millions more have been displaced, particularly in eastern and southern Ukraine, where fighting has caused widespread destruction.
Putin has made the Soviet victory over Nazi Germany a central theme of his 25-year rule, holding large military parades in Moscow each May 9 and invoking the history to justify the war in Ukraine.
The Kremlin, however, is on edge after a series of Ukrainian long-range strikes on energy infrastructure in recent weeks.
Military hardware will be absent from this year’s parade for the first time in nearly two decades, and only a limited number of foreign guests are expected to attend.
Moscow has also intermittently restricted mobile internet access ahead of the celebrations.
Efforts to end Europe’s deadliest conflict since World War II have made little progress and have been overshadowed by the Iran conflict.
Moscow is demanding that Ukraine withdraw from four regions it claims as its own, terms Kyiv has rejected as unacceptable.
