Ukraine has accused Russian forces of violating a ceasefire that Kyiv put forward at midnight between May 5 and 6, with officials reporting casualties in frontline areas located in the northern and eastern parts of the country.
Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha posted on X that "Russia violated the ceasefire initiated by Ukraine at midnight between May 5th and 6th." Sybiha said Russian attacks persisted throughout the night and into the morning, citing strikes on the cities of Kharkiv and Zaporizhzhia. He asserted that the pattern of strikes demonstrated that Russia rejects peace, and described Moscow's announced pause around May 9 as unrelated to diplomatic intent. In his post, Sybiha added a criticism of Russian President Vladimir Putin, saying he "only cares about military parades, not human lives."
The timing of Kyiv's proposal followed Russia's own announcement of a two-day ceasefire covering May 8 to 9, which Moscow said was intended to coincide with commemorations marking the Soviet Union's victory over Nazi Germany in World War Two and a military parade in Red Square. Ukraine offered an open-ended ceasefire starting at midnight on Wednesday, listed as 2100 GMT, and urged Russia to reciprocate. President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said Ukraine would act "symmetrically" from that moment onward.
Ukraine's air force reported multiple warnings after midnight about launches of drones and guided aerial bombs. It said on Wednesday that, since 6 p.m. local time (1500 GMT) the previous day, Russia had launched two ballistic missiles, one cruise missile and 108 drones at Ukrainian territory.
Regional officials reported specific incidents and casualties. In the northern Sumy region, a Russian drone attack on a civilian car on Wednesday morning killed a passenger and wounded the driver, according to the regional governor. In Kharkiv, the country's second largest city, a drone strike early on Wednesday damaged seven private buildings. The city mayor reported the property damage, while the regional governor said one woman suffered an acute stress reaction and another person sought medical attention.
In Zaporizhzhia, where an attack on Tuesday had already killed 12 people, regional authorities said Russian forces struck an industrial infrastructure facility in the early hours of Wednesday. The city of Kryvyi Rih was also hit by a morning drone attack that caused damage to infrastructure, the head of the local military administration said, reporting no injuries in that incident.
Ukrainian officials also noted that Russia launched several attacks on Tuesday, hours before the deadline tied to Kyiv's ceasefire offer, and said those strikes killed at least 27 people. The sequence of events — Kyiv's open-ended proposal, Moscow's separate limited pause around May 8 to 9, and the reported continuation of strikes — left the situation uncertain as to whether any reciprocal cessation of hostilities would take hold.
Contextual notes
The Ukrainian reports detail both the human cost and the damage to civilian and industrial sites following the overnight period of fighting. Local officials provided casualty counts and descriptions of damaged property and infrastructure in multiple regions. Authorities also described a substantial volume of aerial threats detected and addressed by Ukraine's air force in a concentrated time frame beginning the previous evening.