Ukraine marked its Nationwide Flag Day on Saturday with a ceremony attended by President Volodymyr Zelensky in Kiev.
“This very flag embodies a sense of deliverance for these we deliver again from Russian captivity,” Zelensky mentioned in a publish on X. “After they see the Ukrainian colours, they perceive: the evil is over.”
The blue-and-yellow flag additionally represented a logo of hope for Ukrainians dwelling in territory occupied by the Russians, he mentioned.
On Sunday, the war-torn nation will have a good time Independence Day to mark leaving the Soviet Union 34 years in the past. The day additionally marks three and a half years because the full-scale Russian invasion in February 2022.
In Moscow, the Defence Ministry reported that Russian troops have been persevering with their advance in japanese Ukraine, taking the village of Kleban-Byk to the south-east of Kostyantynivka, which is being defended by Ukrainian troops.
If the stories are correct, Ukrainian troops in Shcherbynivka to the south can be just about minimize off, as their retreat is blocked by a dam.
Neither Russian nor Ukrainian army observers confirmed on their maps that Kleban-Byk had been taken, and the Ukrainian Normal Workers report referred solely to assaults on Shcherbynivka.
Earlier the Normal Workers reported {that a} Ukrainian MiG-29 fight jet had crashed whereas touchdown after a sortie, killing the pilot. The reason for the crash was nonetheless being investigated, it mentioned.
The MiG-29, which dates again to the Soviet period, varieties the premise of Ukraine’s small air drive, which has obtained plane of the identical sort from Poland and Slovakia because the full-scale Russian invasion in February 2022.
The air drive additionally reported assaults by 49 Russian drones in a single day, 36 of which had been intercepted. Strikes in seven areas have been reported, and air raid sirens sounded in Kiev through the morning.
Kiev Mayor Vitali Klitschko mentioned air defences have been in operation and that one drone fell onto a highway.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky speaks through the Nationwide Flag Day celebrations and the elevating of the blue and yellow flag on the memorial complicated of the Nationwide Museum of Ukrainian Historical past in World Warfare II. -/Ukrainian Presidency/dpa
