Cars burned out by a Russian drone attack Vyshneve, a southern suburb of Kyiv, Ukraine, August 28, 2026
EA on TVP World and DW News: Why Did CIA Chief Ratcliffe Visit Moscow?
EA-Ukraine VideoCast: A Message on Ukraine’s Independence Day
Thursday’s Coverage: Zelensky Visits Frontline and Appoints New Commanders
UPDATE 1623 GMT:
Ukraine Presidential Chief of Staff Kyrylo Budanov has said of the continuing need for mobilization:
Unfortunately, we have to accept it as it is. We cannot do otherwise. We have to find the courage and honestly say: we cannot mobilize fewer than 30,000 people a month. This is the minimum number needed to maintain what we have.
Budanov acknowledged, “That is a huge number of people….So, no matter how we say that we are now going to recruit people differently, the numbers will not change. And that means the number of dissatisfied people will not change either. There is nothing we can do about it.”
He expressed hope that it will be possible to change the approach to “forceful mobilization” to some extent.
UPDATE 1038 GMT:
Amid fears of a Kremlin-ordered mass mobilization, more than 113,000 Russians left for Georgia last week through the Upper Lars checkpoint.
Alexey Tabalov — founder of School of the Conscript protecting the rights of conscripts and military personnel, noted a recent rise in requests for legal assistance from men of military age, “primarily from those in the military reserve”.
UPDATE 0653 GMT:
“Current and former US officials” say CIA Director John Ratcliffe visited Moscow on Tuesday to share intelligence assessments of the bleak situation for Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
Ratcliffe urged the Russians to agree an end to the invasion before their military and economic situation worsens. He delivered the message to Aleksandr V. Bortnikov, the head of Russia’s State security service.
The sources said the CIA Director made no threats about potential consequences for the Moscow should Vladimir Putin ignore the assessments and continue fighting.
UPDATE 0645 GMT:
Ukrainian drones struck the Slavneft–YANOS oil refinery in Yaroslavl, more than 700 km (435 miles) inside Russia, overnight.
The Astra monitor reported a fire at the complex.
Yaroslavl Governor Mikhail Yevrayev announced a “drone threat” but did not give details about the attack, the eighth on the refinery this year.
"This is f*cked – we’re gonna be without gasoline again!"
The Yaroslavl oil refinery has been struck by drones. Again. A massive fire broke out at the site.
Slavneft-YANOS is one of Russia’s largest oil refineries, with a capacity of ~15 million tons of crude oil per year.
— Anton Gerashchenko (@antongerashchenko.bsky.social) August 28, 2026 at 7:48 AM
Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky said another operation damaged a Tu-95 strategic heavy bomber at the Engels airbase in the Saratov region.
ORIGINAL ENTRY: Ukraine’s capital Kyiv endured 13 air raid alerts from threatened Russian attacks on Thursday, a record during Moscow’s 54-month full-scale invasion.
Residents faced 14 hours and 32 minutes of alerts. The previous record was on March 1, 2022, eight days into the invasion, when Kyiv was under alert 12 times.
At least four people were injured on Thursday. Damage was reported at two schools in the Podilskyi and Shevchenkivskyi districts and a 4-story residential building in Podilskyi. A fire was reported near the Valerii Lobanovskyi Stadium in the city center, and a drone fell on a main road in the Holosiivskyi district in the southern part of the capital.
Ukraine’s Air Force said it downed seven Russian Iskander-M or North Korean-built KN-23 ballistic missiles without disclosing the total number fired.
The alerts continued into Friday, with explosions heard around 12:30 a.m. The warehouses of the Ukrainian postal service Nova Post were attacked in Bilohorodka and Sviatopetrivske in the Kyiv region.
Over the past 15 hours, eight air raid alerts have sounded in Kyiv. During the night, the Russians terrorized the capital with ballistic missiles, then switched to jet-powered drones. It is incredibly exhausting – which, of course, is exactly what Russia is counting on.
— Alina Pereverzieva (@perevaa.bsky.social) August 27, 2026 at 1:53 PM
The Ukraine Foreign Ministry posted:
For regions closer to the frontline, even longer alerts are an everyday reality. But what Kyiv experienced on Aug. 27 shows another way Russia is using its weapons to disrupt civilian life: repeated drone launches keeping a city of millions under threat throughout the day.
This is what Russia’s decision to prolong its war looks like. While Moscow talks about diplomacy, it continues investing in missiles and expanding its capacity to wage war. Russia’s readiness for peace must be judged not by its words, but by what it does – and Russia continues to choose terror and war.
Peace requires actions – and enough pressure to make Russia stop its war.
