(Image by NEIVANMADE)
Air raid alerts for drone swarms are up for drone swarms over Kharkiv, Sumy, Poltava, and Donetsk Oblasts at 1:00 AM local time in Ukraine/6:00 PM EDT.
Russian drones are approaching Kharkiv right now ‼️
— Kate from Kharkiv (@kateinkharkiv.bsky.social) May 28, 2025 at 5:14 PM
Putin’s negotiators are wasting Ukraine and everyone else’s time, which is really a strategy of buying more time for Putin to continue Russia’s genocidal re-invasion of Ukraine.
Russia delays promised ceasefire memorandum ahead of new peace talks, Ukraine says and gives Russia four-day deadline to hand it over.
Russian negotiator claimed he had proposed a specific date and location for exchanging memorandums.
euromaidanpress.com/2025/05/29/r…— Euromaidan Press (@euromaidanpress.bsky.social) May 28, 2025 at 5:55 PM
From EuroMaidan Press:
Ukrainian Defense Minister Rustem Umerov announced that Russia has completed drafting a memorandum outlining steps toward a ceasefire but continues to delay its delivery.
The memorandum process originated from a 19 May phone conversation between Russian President Vladimir Putin and President Trump. Following that call, Putin announced Russia’s readiness to propose a memorandum on ceasefire and future peace agreements, stating the need to find compromises acceptable to both countries.This also follows a meeting in Istanbul on 16 May, when Ukrainian and Russian delegations for the first direct negotiations since 2022, with participation from Türkiye and the US. The Ukrainian delegation was led by Defense Minister Umerov, while the Russian side was headed by Putin’s Aide Vladimir Medinsky.
Ukraine proposed a full and unconditional 30-day ceasefire, an all-for-all prisoner swap, and direct negotiations between Presidents Zelenskyy and Putin, who declined to attend personally. Russia demanded the full withdrawal of Ukrainian troops from four occupied regions claimed by Moscow and refused a ceasefire.
US Vice President J.D. Vance described the negotiation process as having reached a “dead end.”
I wonder what clued the Vice President of a Thousand Names in?
While this is going on, Putin has delivered his own demands separate from whatever his negotiators are supposed to hand over at some point.
President Vladimir Putin’s conditions for ending the war in Ukraine include a demand that Western leaders pledge in writing to stop enlarging NATO eastwards and lift a chunk of sanctions on Russia – Reuters
Their demands are something undoable, thats the point.
1/3
— Kate from Kharkiv (@kateinkharkiv.bsky.social) May 28, 2025 at 8:00 AM
But this russian sources thing is ridiculous and needs to stop. The Russian propaganda machine decides what headlines it wants in Western media. Assigned people deliver pre-agreed narratives and voila! articles appear, citing ‘sources.’ Three of them, no less.
2/3
— Kate from Kharkiv (@kateinkharkiv.bsky.social) May 28, 2025 at 8:00 AM
World media keep delivering Russia propaganda because of pure sensationalism.
Every. Single. Freaking. Time.
3/3
— Kate from Kharkiv (@kateinkharkiv.bsky.social) May 28, 2025 at 8:00 AM
President Zelenskyy traveled to Berlin for meeting with new German Chancellor Friedrich Merz.
Here’s the video of their joint press conference:
Georgia:
Day 182 of continuous #GeorgiaProtests
— Publika.ge (@publikage.bsky.social) May 28, 2025 at 3:28 PM
Day 182. We are winning – slowly but surely!
We just shouldn’t give up before the enemy does! #GeorgiaProtests
📷 @rusudandjakeli.bsky.social
— Marika Mikiashvili 🇬🇪🇺🇦🇪🇺 (@marikamikiashvili.bsky.social) May 28, 2025 at 3:11 PM
🇬🇪 photographer Raymond Red Rodgers added the opera version of the vulgar anti-GD chant (yes, we have that) to the latest firework launching.
I love it.
On rare occasions, it can be slightly amusing to be in the middle of this national disaster.
🎆 = resistance symbol, banned.
— Marika Mikiashvili 🇬🇪🇺🇦🇪🇺 (@marikamikiashvili.bsky.social) May 28, 2025 at 6:45 AM
1/ The U.S. Embassy in Georgia released a statement saying that, at the request of the U.S. Secretary of State, the Ambassador attempted to arrange a meeting with Bidzina Ivanishvili to deliver messages from the Trump administration, but the request was denied.
— Publika.ge (@publikage.bsky.social) May 28, 2025 at 5:45 AM
2/ “Bidzina Ivanishvili has refused to meet with Ambassador Dunnigan to hear a message from the Trump Administration”.
— Publika.ge (@publikage.bsky.social) May 28, 2025 at 5:45 AM
3/ “At Secretary Rubio’s request, on May 22 Ambassador Dunnigan asked for a meeting with Ivanishvili to communicate a message from the Admin and to again relay specific steps the Georgian gov’t can take to show it is serious about resetting its relationship with the US”.
— Publika.ge (@publikage.bsky.social) May 28, 2025 at 5:45 AM
4/ “It is our hope that the Georgian government sincerely wishes to return to 33 years of partnership and friendship with America and the American people”, The statement reads.
— Publika.ge (@publikage.bsky.social) May 28, 2025 at 5:45 AM
Regime MP Irakli Zarkua on the US Embassy: this country has a PM, MFA, so they can communicate with them instead of some backstages – don’t make relationships harder [by adding steps].
No, Irakli, everyone knows that all of you are disposable puppets with relevance below zero.
— Marika Mikiashvili 🇬🇪🇺🇦🇪🇺 (@marikamikiashvili.bsky.social) May 28, 2025 at 5:59 AM
— Marika Mikiashvili 🇬🇪🇺🇦🇪🇺 (@marikamikiashvili.bsky.social) May 28, 2025 at 8:34 AM
Regime collapse is unavoidable, there won’t be a power vacuum in Georgia; a viable political alternative needs to form under the Resistance Platform – says the President.
— Marika Mikiashvili 🇬🇪🇺🇦🇪🇺 (@marikamikiashvili.bsky.social) May 28, 2025 at 3:07 PM
Germany:
Germany will provide Ukraine with military aid worth €5 billion, though the details have not yet been disclosed.
Today, the defense ministers signed an agreement to fund the production of long-range weaponry made in Ukraine.
— WarTranslated (Dmitri) (@wartranslated.bsky.social) May 28, 2025 at 10:14 AM
/1. Germany will finance the future production of long-range weapons systems in Ukraine. The two ministers agreed to this in writing in Berlin.
A significant number of these long-range weapons systems are expected to be produced by 2025.
— 🦋Special Kherson Cat🐈🇺🇦 (@specialkhersoncat.bsky.social) May 28, 2025 at 2:28 PM
/2. The weapons systems will be quickly available to the Ukrainian armed forces—the first ones can be deployed in just a few weeks. www.bmvg.de/de/aktuelles…
— 🦋Special Kherson Cat🐈🇺🇦 (@specialkhersoncat.bsky.social) May 28, 2025 at 2:28 PM
The US:
Reporter: What stopped you from imposing sanctions on russia?
Trump: “I think I’m close to getting a deal. I don’t want to screw it up by doing that…” he says before gears switch abruptly, and he proceeds to blame Biden Zelenskyy and Putin in this order 🤷♀️🤦♀️
— Kate from Kharkiv (@kateinkharkiv.bsky.social) May 28, 2025 at 12:54 PM
“I will let you know in two weeks whether Putin is he is tapping us along or not. And if so, we will respond a little differently.” – Trump.
A month ago, he also said it would be two weeks.
— WarTranslated (Dmitri) (@wartranslated.bsky.social) May 28, 2025 at 12:50 PM
It’s the natsec and foreign policy version of infrastructure week!
Back to Ukraine:
We don’t scream about this enough. We must be much louder. Please, help to amplify.
As Ukrainian POWs die in russian prisons, autopsies point to a system of brutality.
apnews.com/article/russ…— Olena Halushka (@halushka.bsky.social) May 28, 2025 at 7:37 AM
From the AP:
KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — “Everything will be all right.”
Ukrainian soldier Serhii Hryhoriev said this so often during brief phone calls from the front that his wife and two daughters took it to heart. His younger daughter, Oksana, tattooed the phrase on her wrist as a talisman.
Even after Hryhoriev was captured by the Russian army in 2022, his anxious family clung to the belief that he would ultimately be OK. After all, Russia is bound by international law to protect prisoners of war.
When Hryhoriev finally came home, though, it was in a body bag.
A Russian death certificate said the 59-year-old died of a stroke. But a Ukrainian autopsy and a former POW who was detained with him tell a different story about how he died – one of violence and medical neglect at the hands of his captors.
Hryhoriev is one of more than 200 Ukrainian POWs who have died while imprisoned since Russia’s full-scale invasion three years ago. Abuse inside Russian prisons was likely a contributing factor in many of these deaths, according to officials from human rights groups, the U.N., the Ukrainian government and a Ukrainian medical examiner who has performed dozens of POW autopsies.
The officials say the prison death toll adds to evidence that Russia is systematically brutalizing captured soldiers. They say forensic discrepancies like Hryhoriev’s, and the repatriation of bodies that are mutilated and decomposed, point to an effort to cover up alleged torture, starvation and poor health care at dozens of prisons and detention centers across Russia and occupied Ukraine.
Russian authorities did not respond to requests for comment. They have previously accused Ukraine of mistreating Russian POWs — allegations the U.N. has partially backed up, though it says Ukraine’s violations are far less common and severe than what Russia is accused of.
Hryhoriev joined the Ukrainian army in 2019 after he lost his job as an office worker at a high school. When the war began three years later, he was stationed with other soldiers in Mariupol, an industrial port city that was the site of a fierce battle — and far from his home in the central Poltava region.
On April 10, 2022, Hryhoriev called his family to reassure them that “everything will be all right.” That was the last time they ever spoke to him.
Two days later, a relative of a soldier in Hryhoriev’s unit called to say the men had been captured. After Mariupol fell to Russia, more than 2,000 soldiers defending the city became Russian prisoners.
Soon his family got a call from the International Committee of the Red Cross, which confirmed he was alive and officially registered as a POW, guaranteeing his protection under the Geneva Conventions. “We were told: ‘that means everything is fine … Russia has to return him,’” Hryhoriev’s wife, Halyna, recalled.
In August 2022, she received a letter from him, that addressed her by a nickname. “My dear Halochka,” he wrote. “I am alive and well. Everything will be all right.”
Desperate for more information, his daughter Oksana, 31, scoured Russian social media accounts, where videos of Ukrainian POWs regularly appeared. Eventually, she saw him in one — looking gaunt and missing teeth. His gray hair was cropped very short, framing gentle features now partially covered by a beard.
In the video, likely shot under duress, Hryhoriev said to the camera: “I’m alive and well.”
“But if you looked at him, you could see that wasn’t true,” Oksana said.
The truth was dismal, said Oleksii Honcharov, a 48-year-old Ukrainian POW who was detained with him.
Honcharov lived in the same prison barracks as Hryhoriev starting in the fall of 2022. Over a period of months, he witnessed Hryhoriev absorb the same severe punishment as every other POW at the Kamensk-Shakhtinsky Correctional Colony in southwest Russia.
“Everyone got hit — no exceptions,” said Honcharov, who was repatriated to Ukraine in February as part of a prisoner swap. “Some more, some less, but we all took it.”
Honcharov endured months of chest pain while in captivity. Even then, the beatings never stopped, he said, and sometimes they began after his pleas for medical care, which were ignored.
“Toward the end, I could barely walk,” said Honcharov, who was diagnosed with tuberculosis once back in Ukraine – an increasingly common ailment among returning POWs.
A 2024 U.N. report found that 95% of released Ukrainian POWs had endured “systematic” torture. Prisoners described beatings, electric shocks, suffocation, sexual violence, prolonged stress positions, mock executions, and sleep deprivation.
“This conduct could not be more unlawful,” said Danielle Bell, the U.N.’s top human rights monitor in Ukraine.
The report also said some Russian POWs were mistreated by Ukrainian forces during their initial capture — including beatings, threats and electric shocks. But the abuse stopped once Russian POWs were moved to official Ukrainian detention centers, the report said.
Hryhoriev was physically strong and often outlasted younger prisoners during forced exercises, Honcharov recalled. But over time, he began showing signs of physical decline: dizziness, fatigue and, eventually, an inability to walk without help.
Yet despite his worsening condition, prison officials provided only minimal health care, Honcharov said.
Much more at the link.
Nor sure where this is, Russian occupied parts of Ukraine or Russia itself:
Strikes on the Russian air defense systems discovered by the Shark reconnaissance drone
— 🦋Special Kherson Cat🐈🇺🇦 (@specialkhersoncat.bsky.social) May 28, 2025 at 3:46 PM
President Volodymyr Zelenskyy told reporters in Kyiv on Tuesday that Russia had amassed 50,000 troops in its Kursk region “to prepare offensive actions against the Sumy region” of north-eastern Ukraine. www.ft.com/content/607c…
— Christopher Miller (@christopherjm.ft.com) May 28, 2025 at 9:54 AM
There is nothing at that link about President Zelenskyy or Sumy Oblast. But there is at The Guardian:
Ukraine and Germany have agreed to future military cooperation in which Berlin will help finance long-range weapons production on Ukrainian soil.
The deal came as Zelenskyy warned that Russia had amassed 50,000 troops in the Sumy region bordering Russia, where Vladimir Putin has declared an intention to establish a buffer zone.
More at the link, but it’s all about the Ukrainian-German collaboration for weapons production.
Sumy Oblast:
Deadly russian “human safari” threatens the city of Sumy!
— Iryna Voichuk (@irynavoichuk.bsky.social) May 28, 2025 at 9:37 AM
Kherson Oblast:
UN Commission concludes that Russian armed forces’ drone attacks against civilians in Kherson Province amount to crimes against humanity of murder
www.ohchr.org/en/press-rel…
— Kate from Kharkiv (@kateinkharkiv.bsky.social) May 28, 2025 at 3:25 PM
From the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights:
GENEVA / VIENNA, 28 May 2025 – Russian armed forces have committed murder of civilians as crimes against humanity using drones, concludes the Independent International Commission of Inquiry on Ukraine in a new report.
From July 2024, Russian forces have recurrently killed and injured civilians in an area stretching over more than 100 kilometres along the right bank of the Dnipro River in Kherson Province. The drone attacks have been widespread, systematic and conducted as part of a coordinated state policy, the report said.
The attacks followed a regular pattern and the same modus operandi, demonstrating that they were planned, directed, and organized. There is no information suggesting that Russian military and civilian authorities have taken any steps to prevent or stop the commission of the crimes.
Nearly 150 civilians have been killed and hundreds more injured as a result of the drone attacks in Kherson city and 16 localities in the Ukrainian-controlled areas, according to official sources. Victims were men, women, and children, mostly men. Civilians were targeted in various circumstances, as they stepped out to carry out their daily activities whether on foot or in any type of vehicle.
The drone operators used video feeds transmitted in real time by the cameras embedded in the drones, focused on targets that were visibly civilian, and dropped explosives on them. Hundreds of these video feeds have been regularly disseminated on Russian Telegram channels, some of them with thousands of subscribers, displaying the crimes, as well as text posts announcing further attacks.
Ambulances, which have special protection under international law, have been targeted and struck by drones, so as to prevent them from reaching victims who had been previously attacked. Some of these victims have died as a consequence of not being moved to a medical facility in time. A 45-year-old man from Stanislav village recounted that in November 2024, a drone dropped an explosive near him as he was riding a moped, badly injuring his leg. An ambulance arrived, and while he was receiving first aid, a drone dropped two explosives on the ambulance.
The use of drones to target civilians and civilian objects is a violation of the fundamental principle of international humanitarian law, according to which attacks may only be directed at military objects. The evidence collected leaves no doubt that the perpetrators intended to carry out these acts. The Commission therefore concludes that Russian armed forces perpetrated the war crime of intentionally directing attacks against civilians in Kherson Province. It also finds that posting videos of civilians being killed and injured amounts to the war crime of outrages upon personal dignity.
The civilian population in the areas affected by drone attacks lives in constant fear. Residents take risks every time they go outside, as they fear being struck by drones. Many wait for cloudy days to go out, or seek cover under trees, where possible. Fear is further induced by frequent messages posted on Telegram, such as “Get out of the city before the leaves fall, you who are destined to die.”
The circumstances of the attacks, the videos, and the explicit threatening text posts demonstrate that Russian armed forces and those supporting them have committed acts or threats of violence for the primary purpose of spreading terror among the civilian population, in violation of international humanitarian law. Referring to Russian soldiers, a senior health professional of a hospital in Kherson said: “They are simply chasing and hunting civilians who are on their way to work or walking their dogs. They drop explosives from drones like it is a video game.”
The scale and intensity of the drone attacks against civilians and civilian objects as well as the destruction of houses and basic infrastructure, the targeting of all means of transport, and attacks against emergency and rescue services, have all rendered the affected areas unliveable and left many residents with no other choice than to flee.
The recurrent drone attacks, the widely disseminated videos showing them, and numerous posts explicitly exhorting the population to leave suggest a coordinated state policy, on the part of the Russian authorities, to force the population of Kherson Province to leave the area. The Commission therefore concludes that Russian armed forces may have committed the crime against humanity of forcible transfer of population.
The Commission examined over 300 publicly available videos of attacks and over 600 text posts on Telegram channels and, where possible, identified victims of these attacks. It interviewed 91 persons from the areas affected by drone attacks, including victims, witnesses, local authorities and medical personnel.
Background: The UN Independent International Commission of Inquiry on Ukraine is an independent body mandated by the UN Human Rights Council to, among other things, investigate all alleged violations and abuses of human rights and violations of international humanitarian law, and related crimes in the context of the aggression against Ukraine by the Russian Federation. The Commission comprises Erik Møse (Chair), Pablo de Greiff and Vrinda Grover.
The Commissioners were appointed by the President of the UN Human Rights Council; they are not UN staff and do not receive a salary for their work. While the UN Human Rights Office provides support to the Commission of Inquiry, the commissioners serve in their individual capacity and are independent from any government or organization, including the UN. Any views or opinions presented herein are solely those of the mandated commissioners.
Kharkiv Oblast:
Last night, russian forces launched a massive attack on two settlements in Kharkiv Oblast – one near Kharkiv city and another in Chuhuiv district. One civilian was killed, seven injured. Homes, infrastructure, and a civilian enterprise were destroyed.
— Iryna Voichuk (@irynavoichuk.bsky.social) May 28, 2025 at 4:03 AM
An intense night in Kharkiv. There were about a dozen explosions—Russian drones detonating just outside the city. Now, Russian drones are in Kharkiv itself, and we’ve received a warning about possible ballistic missiles heading our way.
01:17— Kate from Kharkiv (@kateinkharkiv.bsky.social) May 27, 2025 at 6:18 PM
Odesa Oblast:
Monitors say 10 Shaheds are buzzing around the southern part if Odesa Oblast, close to the Romanian border. They’ve passed over Prymorsk, Vylkove and now Katlabuh. Target may be Izmail port?
— Euan MacDonald (@euanmacdonald.bsky.social) May 27, 2025 at 8:10 PM
Bakhmut:
AASM Hammer air strike on the Russian command post in Bakhmut t.me/soniah_hub/1…
— 🦋Special Kherson Cat🐈🇺🇦 (@specialkhersoncat.bsky.social) May 28, 2025 at 11:58 AM
Dubna, Moscow Oblast:
drones reportedly targeted the Kronstadt UAV production facility located in Dubna, Moscow Oblast.
The strikes also extended to the Elma Technopark in Zelenograd, Moscow Oblast 👀🔥
— Kate from Kharkiv (@kateinkharkiv.bsky.social) May 28, 2025 at 6:50 AM
The target is over 530 kilometers from the nearest part of Ukraine.
— Euan MacDonald (@euanmacdonald.bsky.social) May 28, 2025 at 2:53 AM
🕊🇺🇦 Tonight, SBU drones struck the strategic “Raduga” enterprise near Moscow, which manufactures cruise missiles.
Ukrainian drones bypassed the air defense system protecting the Russian capital and hit the enterprise’s workshops, where a fire is still burning.
The only sanctions that work! 🔥— Vitalis Viva (@vitalisviva.bsky.social) May 28, 2025 at 12:09 PM
Moscow:
This is the current situation at Moscow’s airports following the visit of the “friendly” drones.
At Sheremetyevo, hundreds of Russians are standing in long lines trying to exchange their tickets for other flights.
— WarTranslated (Dmitri) (@wartranslated.bsky.social) May 28, 2025 at 6:35 AM
That’s enough for tonight.
Your daily Patron!
There are no new Patron skeets or videos today. Here is some adjacent material.
Ukrainian military cats can do everything 😀
— Meanwhile in Ukraine (@meanwhileua.bsky.social) May 27, 2025 at 4:55 PM
Open thread!
wjca
Thank you, Adam.
I hope the early post means you are going to get a decent night’s sleep tonight.
japa21
Thanks Adam. A lot of people are impressed by all the various protests against the Trump administration here, and rightfully so. However, they pale in comparison to what is happening in Georgia.
Gin & Tonic
The early posts mean before my bedtime, which is nice.
The other day my nephew posted a pic from three years ago, when he and four of his close friends (some since childhood) were being sworn in to their volunteer armed forces unit. Two of the five are alive today.
Gin & Tonic
Not sure why the delay. “Give me everything I want and get nothing in return” is a pretty compact memorandum.
Adam L Silverman
@Gin & Tonic: May their memory be a blessing.
Jay
As always, thank you, Adam.
Gin & Tonic
@Adam L Silverman: Thank you.
YY_Sima Qian
Thank you as always, Adam.
Westyny
Thank you, Adam.
AlaskaReader
Thanks Adam
Debbie(Aussie)
@Gin & Tonic: I’m so sorry.
Sister Inspired Revolver of Freedom
Thank you Adam.