KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Russia bombarded Ukrainian cities with missiles, drones and glide bombs, killing at least nine civilians, officials said Tuesday, as Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy warned that Moscow is receiving new military help for its more than 4-year-old invasion from North Korea.
Zelenskyy said Russian forces used ballistic missiles supplied by North Korea in their overnight attack on the southeastern Ukraine city of Zaporizhzhia, where local officials said six people were killed and 19 wounded.
A further three people, including a 15-year-old boy, were killed by Russian drones and artillery in the central Dnipropetrovsk region, local authorities said.
Russia has received additional ballistic missiles from Pyongyang and is preparing to deploy more North Korean troops, Zelenskyy said late Monday.
Russian President Vladimir Putin and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un signed a strategic partnership agreement just over two years ago. It vows mutual aid if either country faces aggression.
Kim has sent thousands of troops and huge supplies of weapons to support Putin’s invasion of Ukraine. Some experts say the engagement with Moscow is helping improve North Korea’s military capabilities, and Zelenskyy warned that the battlefield experience would help Pyongyang menace other countries in its region.
Ukraine says Russia is scaling up its production of ballistic missiles, aiming to exploit Kyiv’s critical shortage of Patriot air defense interceptors that can stop them, and claims Moscow is readying an increase in recruitment for a new push on the front line that stretches 1,250 kilometers (775 miles) along eastern and southern Ukraine.
“Every step Russia takes — increasing ballistic missile production, bringing in North Korean equipment, preparing for mobilization — all of this shows that Moscow is preparing not for peace, but for escalation,” Zelenskyy said on social media.
U.S.-led diplomatic efforts to stop the war have fizzled as Washington grew frustrated with the lack of progress toward a settlement and its attention turned to the Iran war.
“The Kremlin will not enter serious negotiations or make meaningful compromises on its demands as long as Putin believes that he has a viable military path to achieving his full objectives," the Institute for the Study of War, a Washington-based think tank, said in an analysis late Monday.
"Ukraine’s Patriot shortages offer Russia an opportunity to cause very serious damage to Ukraine over the coming winter and will therefore contribute to delaying meaningful negotiations and protracting the war,” it said.
Russian forces also struck parts of the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv, overnight, according to officials. One strike hit the grounds of a children’s hospital, leaving two craters and shattering windows, the State Emergency Service said. Children and medical workers were in bomb shelters and nobody was hurt, it added.
At another location in the capital, a Russian strike started a fire in a warehouse that spread across about 1,200 square meters (nearly 13,000 square feet), according to emergency officials.
The Russian Defense Ministry said that its forces overnight struck “military industrial facilities and transport and logistics centers” in Kyiv and Zaporizhzhia with “ground-based precision weapons.”
It said in a statement Tuesday that it hit drone storage facilities in Kyiv and a metallurgical plant in the city of Zaporizhzhia.
Russia targeted Zaporizhzhia and Kyiv with Zircon anti-ship missiles and Iskander ballistic missiles, while launching 120 long-range strike drones of various types across the country, Ukraine’s air force said.
Meanwhile, the Russian Defense Ministry said that its air defenses overnight intercepted almost 400 Ukrainian drones over 14 Russian regions and occupied Crimea.
Russia’s biggest online retailer, Wildberries, said in a statement that its logistical facilities in the Voronezh region on the border with Ukraine came under attack and caught fire, but it said the fire has been extinguished. It said goods stored at the facilities were “largely undamaged.”
Ukraine has repeatedly struck Wildberries warehouses and has also bombarded Russian oil facilities in what it says is a strategy to compel Putin to negotiate an end to the invasion.
Russian independent online outlet Astra said an oil refinery in the city of Orsk, some 1,300 kilometers from the border with Ukraine, was hit and published images of smoke billowing over it. There was no official confirmation of an attack on the Orsk oil refinery, which has been targeted before.
Follow the AP’s coverage of the war in Ukraine at https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine
FILE - Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskyy looks on during his meeting with U.S. President Donald Trump on the sidelines of the NATO summit in Ankara, Turkey, on July 8, 2026. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon, File)
President Donald Trump secretly flew out of last month's NATO summit in Ankara, Turkey, on an alternate military aircraft while the White House made it appear that the Republican president was flying on Air Force One, according to a report published by The Washington Post on Monday.
The Post said the operation was prompted by an Iranian assassination threat against Trump. The ruse was carried out as journalists and some White House staff members were led to believe they were on the same plane as the president as he began his journey back to Washington from the annual gathering of NATO country leaders.
The Post cited material reviewed by the newspaper, a U.S. official familiar with the operation and another person with knowledge of the president’s travel. The Associated Press has not independently confirmed the report.
Trump had flown to the summit in a new Qatari-gifted and retrofitted red, white and navy blue jet. But ahead of departing Turkey, he said he would fly partway home on an older-model baby blue Air Force One plane instead.
The president at the time said the new luxury jet was being flown out ahead of his departure from Ankara to give some U.S. troops based in eastern England a chance to check out the new Air Force One.
In Ankara, Trump boarded the old Air Force One jumbo jet in view of television cameras ahead of the plane flying to Royal Air Force Mildenhall in the United Kingdom.
However, according to the Post report, after boarding the legacy Air Force One jet, he was secretly shuttled minutes later to a smaller plane — an Air Force C-32A — via an airport catering truck typically used to load meals and other supplies. Trump flew to Mildenhall on that smaller jet.
The White House did not respond directly to questions about the Post report of the secret operation to whisk Trump out of the country on a third aircraft, or the reported elaborate ruse to make it appear he was on the baby blue Air Force One jet flying to Mildenhall.
“As the President has said recently, there are many enemies of America who have their sights on him, and we use every tool at our disposal to address those threats,” White House communications director Steven Cheung said in a statement.
The U.S. Secret Service declined to comment. The Air Force, which maintains the fleet of executive travel aircraft, referred questions to the White House.
While Trump was in Turkey, the U.S. military conducted a series of large strikes in Iran in retaliation for its attacks on merchant shipping in the region.
The New York Times and CBS News reported last month that intelligence officials had raised concerns about a potential attack on the president or his jet, triggering additional precautions and the decision not to use the newly inaugurated aircraft gifted to Trump by Qatar for the first leg of Trump’s trip home from Ankara.
The swap had spurred questions about the security of the Qatar-provided aircraft, and Trump said last month after the trip that it would undergo additional upgrades.
Cheung on Monday maintained that the new, Qatari-gifted plane was “a state-of-the-art aircraft that has been fitted with high-level security protocols that ensure the safety of the President and his staff.”
The new Post report on clandestinely putting Trump on a third aircraft and quietly whisking him out of the country adds a fresh layer to just how seriously concerned U.S. security officials were about the threat against Trump during the ongoing war with Iran.
Paul Eckloff, a former special agent with the Secret Service, said such an unusual move could either reflect actionable intelligence or an abundance of caution given volatility in the region with the wars in Iran and Ukraine.
“I would not say unprecedented, but it is an unusual occurrence,” Eckloff told The Associated Press.
The Post reported that to exit that plane without being seen by those uninvolved in the operation, Trump and several aides stepped aboard an airport catering truck, which was elevated planeside using hydraulics and positioned at a door on the opposite side of Air Force One’s entrance.
The small group of reporters who thought they were traveling with Trump were advised to lower their window shades ahead of takeoff.
After arriving at Mildenhall, news photographers captured images of Trump getting off the presidential plane — suggesting he reboarded Air Force One out of sight of the pack of journalists who thought they were traveling with him.
Democratic Sen. Richard Blumenthal called for a congressional investigation.
“It is unprecedented and it is surreal,” he said Monday on CNN, calling the incident “downright scary.”
After the brief visit to the base at Mildenhall, Trump boarded the new Air Force One aircraft to fly the rest of the way to Washington.
During a gaggle with reporters aboard the aircraft, Trump was asked directly if there was any credible threats on Air Force One by Iran.
“Well, I have a threat all the time. I’m number one on their list before you,” Trump said. He added to the traveling reporters, “But if I go, you go.”
AP writers Josh Boak, Aamer Madhani and Konstantin Toropin contributed reporting.
A catering truck is parked at Air Force One on the tarmac as the motorcade carrying U.S. President Donald Trump arrives on the tarmac to depart following the NATO summit at Ankara International Airport in Ankara, Turkey, Wednesday, July 8, 2026. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
President Donald Trump talks to service members as he switches planes at U.S. Air Force Base, RAF Mildenhall in Suffolk Eastern England, on his way back to Washington from the NATO summit in Ankara, Turkey, Wednesday, July 8, 2026. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
Catering trucks are parked at Air Force One on the tarmac as the motorcade carrying U.S. President Donald Trump arrives on the tarmac to depart following the NATO summit at Ankara International Airport in Ankara, Turkey, Wednesday, July 8, 2026. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
FILE - A catering truck is parked at Air Force One on the tarmac as the motorcade carrying U.S. President Donald Trump arrives to depart following the NATO summit at Ankara International Airport in Ankara, Turkey, Wednesday, July 8, 2026. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
Catering trucks are parked at Air Force One on the tarmac as the motorcade carrying U.S. President Donald Trump arrives on the tarmac to depart following the NATO summit at Ankara International Airport in Ankara, Turkey, Wednesday, July 8, 2026. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
As Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth watches at left, President Donald Trump gestures as he switches planes at U.S. Air Force Base, RAF Mildenhall in Suffolk Eastern England, on his way back to Washington from the NATO summit in Ankara, Turkey, Wednesday, July 8, 2026. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
