Russia launched a wave of 102 drones against Ukraine overnight into Thursday, striking residential areas in Kharkiv and several other cities even as both sides had announced separate ceasefire initiatives. In Kharkiv, Ukraine's second-largest city located in the northeast close to the Russian border, nine people were wounded — including a seven-year-old child and a 15-year-old girl — when drones hit the Novobavarskyi residential district. Mayor Ihor Terekhov confirmed that approximately eight private homes were damaged and a civilian vehicle destroyed in the resulting fire. Ukraine's air defences intercepted 92 to 97 of the incoming drones, but several got through, causing strikes at six different locations across the country.
The attacks extended well beyond Kharkiv. A ballistic missile was fired at the city of Dnipro in central Ukraine, and injuries were also reported in the southern city of Kherson. In the Sumy region to the northeast, a drone strike on a kindergarten on Wednesday killed two staff members, though no children were present at the time. Earlier in the week, Russian bomb strikes on the eastern city of Kramatorsk killed at least three people, and attacks on the southeastern city of Zaporizhzhia caused further casualties.
The escalation is unfolding against a backdrop of fragile and contradictory ceasefire announcements. President Volodymyr Zelensky declared a unilateral Ukrainian silence from midnight on 6 May, while Russia separately announced a halt to hostilities for 8 and 9 May to coincide with its Victory Day commemorations marking the Soviet defeat of Nazi Germany. Kyiv reported more than 1,800 alleged Russian violations within the first ten hours of its own ceasefire declaration. Zelensky justified subsequent Ukrainian long-range drone strikes deep into Russian territory — including a reported attack on an oil facility near Perm, roughly 1,500 kilometres from Ukraine — as a "mirror response" to continued Russian aggression. Russia's defence ministry claimed to have intercepted 347 Ukrainian drones overnight, one of the highest figures it has ever reported.
The stakes around Victory Day have raised alarms beyond the battlefield. Russia's foreign ministry, through spokesperson Maria Zakharova, warned foreign embassies to evacuate staff from Kyiv, stating that a large-scale Russian retaliatory strike on the capital would be "inevitable" if Ukraine disrupted the 9 May festivities. Ukraine separately reported striking a Russian Karakurt-class corvette — a vessel capable of firing Kalibr cruise missiles — in the Caspian Sea near Kaspiysk in the Russian republic of Dagestan, though the extent of any damage remains unconfirmed.
The humanitarian toll underscores why the pattern matters. Despite Ukrainian air defences achieving an interception rate of over 90 percent for Shahed-style drones in recent months, the sheer volume and persistence of Russian strikes continues to cause civilian casualties and infrastructure damage. Kharkiv, owing to its location just tens of kilometres from the Russian border, has been one of the most frequently targeted cities throughout the conflict. With both sides accusing each other of bad faith and no verified mutual ceasefire in place, the prospects for even a temporary halt to the violence remain uncertain.