What’s the latest in Ukraine? Day 753

Dozens of Ukrainians have been killed in the Black Sea port city of Odessa during a month of Russian missile strikes

Rescuers carry an injured colleague at the site of a Russian missile strike in Odessa on Friday (via REUTERS)

Odessa comes under attack again as Russia launches multiple drones, Ukraine says. Kyiv’s southern military command issued three warnings in the very early hours of Sunday morning of unmanned aerial vehicle (UAVs) strikes from Russian-held territory. “A new group of strike UAVs from the Black Sea in the direction of Odessa,” the warning on Telegram read. Regional governor Oleh Kiper urged Odessa residents to “please stay in shelters until the end of the strike”. Residents heard explosions in the southern city shortly after midnight, according to a Suspilne news correspondent. A day of mourning was in place on Saturday in Odessa following Russia’s deadliest attack in recent history on the city on Friday, during which at least 20 people were killed.

Anti-Vladimir Putin Russians prepare for a midday protest, known as the final will of the late opposition leader Alexei Navalny. Russians opposing the regime and its war in Ukraine are being called to rush to polling stations today at midday for “Noon Against Putin”. The campaign’s website says the plan is simply to “show others and see for ourselves that there are many of us” on the final day of presidential elections in Russia. You can read more about the plan here. The Moscow Prosecutor’s Office, meanwhile, has warned that participation against such a rally risks a maximum sentence of up to eight years.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky thanks the country’s special forces for “new long-range capabilities” after strikes on Russian oil refineries. In his nightly address on Saturday, Mr Zelensky said the past weeks have “demonstrated to many that the Russian war machine has vulnerabilities that we can reach with our weapons”. Earlier on Saturday, Russian officials struggled to bring under control a fire at the Syzran refinery southeast of Moscow caused by Ukrainian drone strikes. A Ukrainian intelligence source said multiple other refineries in the region were attacked.

UK Defence Minister Grant Shapps had to cancel a trip to the Ukrainian port city of Odessa after British intelligence warned there was a credible threat of Russia targeting him with missiles, it has been reported. The minister was due to travel to the southern city on the Black Sea in early March, just days after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky suffered a near-miss in Odessa when a Russia missile landed roughly 500 metres away.

Russia will be asked to observe a ceasefire in Ukraine during the Paris Olympics, French President Emmanuel Macron said in an interview from Paris shown on Ukrainian television and posted by a Ukrainian journalist on her YouTube channel on Saturday. “The demand for a ceasefire during the Olympics. They (the Russians) must do this. That is what has always happened,” the interviewer said, speaking through an interpreter. “It will be requested,” Mr Macron says in French before a voiceover interpretation gives his response in Ukrainian as “Yes, we will ask for it.”