Ukraine-Russia war live: Putin has violated Easter ceasefire 469 times including ambulance strike, Kyiv says

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Volodymyr Zelensky made no reference to alleged ceasefire violations in his nightly video address.

He said Ukraine would stick to the truce and called on Russia to keep it going beyond Orthodox Easter.

As things stand, the truce will end at midnight tonight, Moscow time.

“It would be right for the ceasefire to continue ⁠beyond this,” Zelensky said.

“We have made this proposal to Russia and if Russia once again chooses war instead of peace, it will show ‌the world, and particularly the United ​States, who truly wants what.”

Zelensky has proposed a ‌halt to fighting on a number of occasions, ​but has been turned down by Moscow, which claims it is seeking an overall settlement. Critics say Vladimir Putin is attempting to seize as much territory as possible before any peace deal that would freeze the frontlines where they stand.

The Ukrainian General Staff said in a late evening report on Saturday night that it had counted 469 Russian ceasefire infringements since the truce came into force at 4pm Moscow time.

“Specifically, 22 enemy assault actions, 153 shelling incidents, 19 strikes by attack drones … and 275 strikes by (First-Person View) drones,” it said as part of an update on the frontline situation.

According to the calendar of the Orthodox faith, which is dominant in both Russia and Ukraine, Easter is celebrated this year on Sunday 12 April.

During ‌a similar 30-hour Easter ceasefire agreed last year, each side accused the other of infringements.

Ukrainian officials say a Russian drone struck an ambulance in Sumy Oblast overnight, injuring three paramedics – one of hundreds of alleged ceasefire violations.

Vladimir Putin said his forces would observe a truce for Orthodox Easter from 4pm on Saturday to the end of Sunday, but both sides have accused each other of breaching it.

Sumy Oblast is in northeastern Ukraine, and is one of a number of border regions that have faced sustained ground and air attacks throughout the war, though Russia holds no significant territory there.

The region’s military administration issued an update on the strike which read: “Three medics were injured. They were promptly provided with assistance,” according to the Kyiv Independent.

“The enemy cynically continues to attack civilian infrastructure. Be as cautious as possible,” it warned.

The Ukrainian military says Russia has already violated the Easter ceasefire 469 times since it began. Neither Volodymyr Zelensky nor the Kremlin have commented on the alleged violations.

With both sides accusing each other of violating the Easter truce, which began at 4pm Moscow time on Saturday, governors of two Russian regions said Ukrainian drone strikes had injured people.

Alexander Khinshtein, governor ​of ⁠Russia’s Kursk border region, wrote on the state-backed ‌messenger service MAX that a Ukrainian drone had struck a petrol station in the town of Lgov, injuring three people, including a child.

Khinshtein said the attack took place after the start of the truce.

In the ‌adjacent Belgorod region, Governor Vyacheslav Gladkov said two people were ‌injured in Ukrainian drone attacks.

Gladkov, writing on Telegram, said a man and woman were injured in attacks in Shebekino and Grayvoron, two small towns just inside the border. He also said Ukrainian forces had shelled Shebekino, damaging homes and other buildings.

A local Russia-installed official ⁠in a part of southern Kherson region held by Moscow also reported on social media that a Ukrainian drone attack had injured one person.

Russia and Ukraine on yesterday accused each other of violating a brief ceasefire in their four-year-old war hours into the truce put in place to mark Orthodox Easter.

The General Staff of Ukraine’s military said Russian forces had violated the terms of the 32-hour truce 469 times, including assault actions, shelling and drone strikes.

Governors of two Russian border regions said Ukrainian drones had attacked targets in ⁠the Kursk and Belgorod regions, injuring five people.

The ceasefire, announced by Russian president Vladimir Putin on Thursday, went into effect at 4pm Moscow time (1300 GMT). Ukraine had initially proposed the truce and said it would observe it if Russia did so too.

Ukraine and Russia are moving towards a potential deal to end the war, Bloomberg News reported on Friday, citing the top aide to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

Kyrylo Budanov, a former head of Ukraine’s military intelligence, said that he saw progress towards a deal, but declined to say what a potential compromise on territory, a key stumbling block, would look like.

“No final decision has been made yet,” he said, according to the report. “But, in principle, everyone now clearly understands the limits of what is acceptable. That’s enormous progress.”

“They all understand the war needs to end. That’s why they are negotiating,” Budanov said in an interview with Bloomberg on April 4. “I don’t think it will be long.”

Nato member Estonia says it cannot afford to detain ​Russia’s “shadow fleet” vessels in the Baltic Sea and risk the chance Moscow will respond with military force.

Britain and other European nations, including France, Belgium and ⁠Sweden, have stepped up efforts to detain ageing oil tankers used by Moscow to evade sanctions and secure vital funding for its four-year war against Ukraine.

But Estonia, the northernmost Baltic state located close to Russia’s main oil and fuel export facilities in the Gulf of Finland, is practising restraint after an unsuccessful ⁠attempt to board a Russian vessel last year.

“The ​risk ⁠of military escalation is just too high,” Estonia’s Navy Commander Ivo Vark told Reuters.

In May 2025 Estonia said Moscow sent a fighter jet into Nato airspace ⁠over the Baltic Sea during an Estonian attempt to stop an unflagged Russia-bound oil ​tanker ⁠it believed was defying Western sanctions.

The jet ‌eventually escorted the oil tanker into Russian waters.