Air War in Ukraine - Progress on the ground has slowed, civilian killings are escalating
During the monitored period from April 1 to April 30, several trends were confirmed. Ukraine accepted proposals for a 30-day unconditional ceasefire to start negotiations on a lasting peace, but Russia rejected it and kept setting various impossible conditions. Russian officials probably skipped school when the meaning of the word “unconditional” was taught… Moscow pretends it’s winning, but its actual progress on the ground is minimal. At the same time, attacks on Ukrainian civilians have intensified with unprecedentedly bloody results.
Miro Barič
Progress on the ground has slowed, civilian killings are escalating
During the monitored period from April 1 to April 30, several trends were
confirmed. Ukraine accepted proposals for a 30-day unconditional ceasefire
to start negotiations on a lasting peace, but Russia rejected it and kept setting
various impossible conditions. Russian officials probably skipped school when the
meaning of the word “unconditional” was taught… Moscow pretends it’s winning,
but its actual progress on the ground is minimal. At the same time, attacks
on Ukrainian civilians have intensified with unprecedentedly bloody results.
Aerial War in Ukraine
The first day of the monitored period was
an exception. On the night of Tuesday, April 1,
Russia did not send any kamikaze drones to
Ukraine for the first time this year. It launched
only two cruise missiles and both were shot
down by Ukrainian air defense.
Then, unfortunately, everything returned to
the old ways. On Friday, April 4, an Iskander-M
missile with a cluster warhead hit a children’s
playground in a residential area of the city of
Kryvyi Rih. Thirty-four apartment buildings,
schools, shops, and cars were damaged.
Worse still, 20 people were killed and another
60 were injured. Among the dead were nine
children. The youngest victim was Tymofiy,
who was three years and nine months old.
He was on the playground with his grandmother
at the time of the attack. Many children were
among the injured, the youngest being just
three months old.
Russian cynical propaganda, of course,
declared that the precise target of the attack
was a restaurant where Ukrainian officers
had gathered with their Western instructors.
Eighty-five soldiers, including NATO officers,
were supposedly killed. This Russian lie is
even more pathetic than usual. The restaurant
was not hit—it only had broken windows from
the explosions on the nearby playground.
Moreover, it has security cameras that were
recording at the moment of the attack. The
footage shows just a few people in civilian
clothes, no “dozens of Ukrainian officers and
their NATO counterparts.”
On Tuesday, April 8, it had been three
years since another Russian war crime.
In 2022, Russians fired a missile with a cluster
warhead at the train station in Kramatorsk,
dispersing submunitions into a crowd of
civilians waiting to be evacuated. Fifty-three
people were killed, including nine children,
and hundreds more were injured. Russia has
not admitted responsibility for this crime
(or others), despite clear findings by
international investigations. And its atrocities
continue to this day.
The Worst Attack
On Sunday, April 13, the target was the
Ukrainian city of Sumy. This time, the pretext
was a supposed attack on Ukrainian soldiers
who were to receive awards at a congress
center. In reality, there were no soldiers in
danger at any time. Two Iskander-M ballistic
missiles with cluster warheads struck busy
streets full of people heading to church for
Palm Sunday services. The result was 35 dead
and 129 injured. It was the worst attack on
Ukrainian civilians since 2023.
According to the Ukrainians, the rocket
attack on Sumy was carried out by two Russian
units—the 112th and the 448th rocket artillery
brigades. Both became targets of retaliation
in the following days. On Tuesday, April 15,
the 448th brigade’s position in the village
of Klyukva in Russia’s Kursk region was hit.
Russian channels reported heavy losses
and complained that they could have been
easily avoided because the base’s location
was publicly known and soldiers didn’t try to
conceal it better. On the following two days—
April 16 and 17—the base of the 112th Guards
Rocket Artillery Brigade in Shuya, Ivanovo
region, was hit twice by Ukrainian drones.
Two fighter jets from the 114th Tactical Aviation Brigade of the Ukrainian Air Force.
In the foreground is a MiG-29UB with “white 20“ fuselage number
UKRAINE
INFO Eduard26
June 2025