Ukraine-Russia war latest: Nato jets scrambled to shoot down foreign drone after it enters Latvian airspace

Ukrainian forces have recaptured 745 sq km of territory in the southeastern Oleksandrivka sector since the start of the year, Volodymyr Zelensky said on Wednesday. The operation, which Ukraine says began in January, has brought 26 settlements back under Ukrainian control across the Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk and Zaporizhzhia regions. Zelensky said the offensive was carried out “with precision – exactly as planned”. The gains broadly align with assessments by Ukrainian open-source monitoring group DeepState, which has confirmed the recapture of 19 settlements and Ukrainian advances in six other areas.

The reported territorial gains refer specifically to the Oleksandrivka sector, rather than Ukraine’s overall battlefield position. Russia continues to make advances elsewhere along the front, particularly in Donetsk, although analysts say its overall rate of territorial gains has slowed this year.