Free Republic

Russian defense ministry officials on Sunday insisted that an airstrike on the port of Odesa — less than a day after Russia and Ukraine signed an agreement on resuming grain shipments from there — had hit only military targets. “In the seaport in the city of Odesa, on the territory of a shipyard, sea-based high-precision long-range missiles destroyed a docked Ukrainian warship and a warehouse with Harpoon anti-ship missiles supplied by the U.S. to the Kyiv regime,” ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov said at a daily briefing. The Ukrainian military said on Saturday that Moscow had attacked Odesa’s sea port with...

Russian forces have withdrawn from Ukraine's Snake Island, a strategic outpost in the Black Sea, Russia's defence ministry and Ukraine's president's office said on Thursday. "KABOOM! No Russian troops on the Snake Island anymore. Our Armed Forces did a great job," Andriy Yermak, head of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy's office, wrote on Twitter. Russia's defence ministry confirmed Russian troops had withdrawn from Snake Island, calling it a "goodwill gesture"

Russia's defence ministry said on Friday that the first phase of its military operation in Ukraine was mostly complete and that it would focus on completely "liberating" eastern Ukraine's Donbass region. The announcement appeared to indicate that Russia may be switching to more limited goals after running into fierce Ukrainian resistance in the first month of the war