Ukraine said its troops had captured 600 Russian soldiers in the Kursk region, adding a new claim of battlefield momentum to a campaign that has already drawn strong international attention.
The supplied DW live update says Kyiv also claimed control of 100 settlements in Kursk. Those figures, if accurate, would point to a striking advance inside Russian territory. The same update notes that Ukraine had also test-fired a domestically produced ballistic missile for the first time, though it gave no further technical details.
The broader picture in the report is one of continued intense exchange. Russian missile and drone strikes killed at least six people in several Ukrainian regions, including three in Kryvyi Rih and three in Zaporizhzhia. Another four people were injured in the Kharkiv region, and officials said one person in Kryvyi Rih was still missing after a hotel was destroyed.
The war’s air defense dimension remains central. Ukraine said it shot down five of ten incoming missiles and 60 of 81 drones on Tuesday, one day after Moscow’s largest air attack of the war at that point. NATO then announced that the NATO-Ukraine Council would meet at Kyiv’s request, with Ukrainian Defense Minister Rustem Umerov due to brief allies on battlefield conditions and equipment needs.
The report also says President Volodymyr Zelenskyy claimed Ukrainian forces had used Western-supplied F-16 jets to shoot down drones and missiles in recent attacks. That detail matters because it indicates that aircraft long sought by Kyiv were already being put to use in air defense operations, even as Ukraine’s older Soviet-era jets remained under strain.
Zelenskyy also used the moment to press a broader diplomatic strategy. The update says he wants the next peace summit to be held in the Global South, potentially with Russian participation if Moscow wants to attend. He said the war would eventually end in dialogue, but only after Ukraine had been placed in a stronger position.
The ballistic missile test fits that same logic. Ukraine has repeatedly sought to show it can build or adapt more advanced long-range weapons rather than depend entirely on foreign aid. The report says Zelenskyy announced the first successful test of a Ukrainian-made ballistic missile at a press conference in Kyiv, though he declined to share more details.
The combination of claims in the update is significant. On one side, Kyiv is saying it has expanded its reach into Kursk and is developing its own missile capability. On the other, Russia is continuing heavy bombardment of Ukrainian civilian areas. That pairing suggests a war in which each side is still trying to create strategic advantage through both battlefield action and messaging.
None of the claims in the supplied report resolve the wider strategic picture, but they do show that the conflict remains highly fluid. Prisoners, settlements, missiles and air defenses all feature in the same 24-hour news cycle, which is a reminder that neither side has settled into a stable front.
