Daytime airstrikes using drones and missiles
Russia presses Ukraine to abandon Donbas
Moscow pins blame for the war on Kyiv
At least five people were killed after Russia responded to Ukraine’s truce proposal with a series of drone and missile strikes.
Ukraine had proposed an Easter and energy cease-fire, but Moscow dismissed the offer as a “show” and rejected it outright.
Russian forces launched indiscriminate attacks
AFP and Reuters reported that on the 1st, Russia launched drone and missile strikes against Ukrainian targets from dawn into the afternoon. The assaults killed four people inside Ukraine, and in the frontline Kherson region a vehicle struck by a drone left a fifth victim.
Ukraine carried out a retaliatory strike on a missile-parts plant in Russia’s Bryansk region. Kyiv’s counterattack came after its offer of an Easter and energy truce; Moscow has argued the proposal was intended to buy Ukrainian forces time to regroup.
Moscow has also shifted strikes that were once concentrated at dawn into daytime operations. Russian forces are planning to launch several hundred drones during morning and afternoon hours.
Military analysts say the daytime raids are intended to unnerve Ukraine and degrade defenses ahead of what Moscow may view as a potential large-scale offensive once winter conditions ease.
Russia continues pressing Ukraine to abandon Donbas
Meanwhile, Moscow has maintained pressure for peace terms that would require Kyiv to cede control of the entire Donbas region. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov urged President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to decide immediately whether to withdraw from Donbas and move beyond the boundary of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic.
Peskov blamed Kyiv for the human cost of the conflict, saying Zelenskyy must take responsibility and make hard decisions. “If he had, we could have saved countless lives and ended the fiercest phases of the war,” he asserted.
Russia has also shifted blame for stalled negotiations to other countries, saying talks have faltered because the U.S. is preoccupied with developments in the Middle East, and broadly casting responsibility for casualties and the peace process onto third parties.
Concerns over possible cuts to weapons support
Concerns have persisted for a month that U.S. weapons support to Ukraine could be reduced following the United States’ entry into a war with Iran.
After years of combat, Ukraine has developed strong capabilities for intercepting Russian drones, but it remains short of the air-defense interceptors needed to defeat ballistic missiles.
As the U.S. and its Middle East partners expend large quantities of air-defense missiles defending against Iranian retaliatory strikes, analysts warn Ukraine could be pushed down the priority list for Patriot systems.
U.S. officials say planned weapons deliveries to Ukraine remain unchanged, but Patriot stocks in the Middle East are running low and the situation could shift rapidly.
