Three-Day Russia-Ukraine Truce Begins, With Violations Alleged on Both Sides

A three-day ceasefire between Russia and Ukraine began Saturday, a day after President Trump announced it, and the first hours were quieter than usual but not free of attacks. The Kyiv Independent reported that a Russian drone hit a nine-story residential building in Kharkiv late Saturday, less than 24 hours into the truce, according to Kharkiv Oblast Governor Oleh Syniehubov. No casualties were reported, though two 8-year-old boys had acute stress reactions.

The truce runs from May 9 to 11, the Kyiv Independent said. Trump announced it Friday, after Russia and Ukraine had each put forward separate ceasefire proposals, the Kyiv Independent said, and he wrote on Truth Social that it could be “the beginning of the end” of the war, AFP reported in the Moscow Times. Moscow and Kyiv accused each other of violations, but no major strikes were reported, and the two sides agreed to exchange 1,000 prisoners each during the pause. Putin said Russia had not yet received Ukrainian proposals on the exchange, according to AFP. The Kremlin said it had no current plans to extend the truce.

AFP reported that two earlier truce attempts that week had failed. The Kyiv Independent said Russia had announced a 48-hour Victory Day truce for May 8-9 and that Ukraine then declared its own ceasefire starting at midnight May 6. President Volodymyr Zelensky said Russia had violated Kyiv’s proposed ceasefire 1,820 times by 10 a.m. the following morning, the Kyiv Independent reported; that was his claim and was not independently verified. Zelensky also issued a decree “allowing” Russia to hold its parade on Red Square without Ukrainian drone strikes.

In Moscow, President Vladimir Putin presided over a scaled-down Victory Day parade that, for the first time in nearly two decades, had no military hardware, AFP reported. The parade was cut back after Ukrainian long-range attacks in recent weeks, and Russia imposed intermittent internet shutdowns during the event. Only the leaders of Belarus, Malaysia, Laos, Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan were listed as attending; Xi Jinping had attended last year.

Putin told soldiers they faced an “aggressive force” backed by NATO and said his war aims are “just.” He also said the conflict “is heading to an end but it’s still a serious matter,” AFP reported, and that Western countries’ expectation that Russia would collapse “didn’t work out.” He said he would meet Zelensky in a third country only after all conditions of a peace deal were settled, calling such a meeting “the final point, not the negotiations themselves.”

The fighting did not stop on the front. Ukraine’s General Staff reported 121 combat clashes on Saturday, and local officials reported two civilian deaths in Zaporizhzhia and Dnipropetrovsk regions, the Kyiv Independent reported.

AFP noted that U.S.-mediated peace talks have made little progress since February, when Washington shifted its attention to its war with Iran. The war is in its fifth year and has killed hundreds of thousands of people, the news agency said, making it Europe’s deadliest conflict since World War II.