As the war edges toward a fourth winter, this week in Ukraine was dominated by two interconnected battles: Russia’s grinding push around the strategic eastern hub of Pokrovsk, and an escalation in long-range strikes designed to break Ukraine’s power grid and sap civilian resilience. Ukraine, in turn, continued to hit back deep inside Russia with drone attacks on oil infrastructure, while Western capitals announced new military support and explored controversial diplomatic initiatives that could reshape the terms of any eventual peace.
On the eastern front, Pokrovsk in Donetsk Oblast remained the focal point of Russia’s offensive. Russian forces continued efforts to squeeze Ukrainian units in and around the Pokrovsk–Myrnohrad pocket, deploying additional elements of at least two combined-arms units, in what analysts describe as an attempt to complete an encirclement.
Ukrainian commanders acknowledge that the situation is difficult, with Russian troops consolidating positions inside parts of Pokrovsk, and putting sustained pressure on the remaining supply corridors. Independent assessments suggest that although Moscow has degraded Pokrovsk’s role as a logistics hub since the summer, Ukrainian forces are still holding key defensive lines and have not yet been forced into a disorderly retreat.
Fierce urban combat continues, and both sides report heavy casualties without decisive territorial shifts over the past week.
Further north and west along the eastern front, Russia kept up attacks near Kupiansk and in sectors linked to the broader Pokrovsk offensive, seeking to stretch Ukrainian reserves and complicate Kyiv’s efforts to stabilize the line.
Ukrainian officials say they are rotating additional special forces and mechanized units into the area to plug gaps, and have reported limited counter-attacks near some villages at the base of the Dobropillia salient to blunt Russian advances.
The overall picture is one of incremental Russian gains in ruined towns and industrial zones, but no breakthrough that would radically alter the map in the short term.
While the front lines moved slowly, the air war intensified dramatically. On the night of 18–19 November, Russia launched what Ukrainian officials described as one of the largest combined drone-and-missile barrages in months, firing 476 strike and decoy drones and 48 missiles of various types at targets across the country.
Many of the missiles were intercepted, including by newly deployed Western-supplied F-16 and Mirage-2000 jets, but enough got through to cause devastating damage. A Kh-101 cruise missile slammed into a residential high-rise in the western city of Ternopil, killing at least 25 people, including children, and injuring well over 100.
Emergency services warned that dozens more remained missing under the rubble as rescuers worked through the debris in freezing temperatures.
The same overnight wave hit multiple regions, including Lviv, Ivano-Frankivsk, Kharkiv, Dnipropetrovsk and Khmelnytskyi, striking power plants, substations, industrial sites and public transport infrastructure. Ukraine’s energy ministry reported emergency blackouts in several oblasts as grid operators struggled to stabilize the system, and officials noted that similar night-time attacks on energy infrastructure have been occurring almost every day for weeks.
Earlier in the week, another mass strike on Kyiv, Odesa and Kharkiv left gaping holes in apartment blocks, killed and injured civilians, and again forced authorities to ration electricity.
UN human rights monitors say civilian casualty figures for 2025 are already significantly higher than last year, driven in part by the renewed focus on critical infrastructure.
Russia’s campaign also extended to Ukraine’s ports and maritime energy imports. In the Odesa region, a
Turkish-flagged tanker, the MT Orinda, was hit by a drone and set ablaze while unloading liquefied petroleum gas at Izmail, a key Danube port. All 16 crew members were evacuated, but the incident triggered emergency measures on both the Ukrainian and Romanian sides of the river and highlighted the risks to new routes for U.S. and other Western fuel supplies into Ukraine. The same wave of attacks killed at least five civilians and injured 13 others in the Kharkiv and Dnipropetrovsk regions, Ukrainian officials said.
Meanwhile, Russian forces continued frequent drone and missile launches at other energy facilities and railway nodes, aiming to disrupt both civilian life and the military logistics that depend heavily on Ukraine’s rail network.
Ukraine has not remained passive under this onslaught. Over the past week, Kyiv intensified deep-strike drone operations against Russian oil and energy infrastructure. In the Ryazan region, about 200 kilometers from Moscow, Ukrainian drones hit an oil refinery, causing a large fire that Russian officials blamed on debris from intercepted UAVs.
Near the Black Sea, Ukrainian naval and aerial drones again targeted facilities linked to Russia’s vital oil export routes. A strike near the port of Novorossiysk damaged an oil depot and reportedly forced a temporary halt in some oil shipments, according to industry sources. Ukraine also claimed to have hit an electricity substation in Russia’s Ulyanovsk region. These attacks, Kyiv argues, are meant to degrade Russia’s capacity to fund and conduct its air campaign against Ukrainian cities. Moscow, in turn, is tightening its domestic defenses against such strikes. This week, Russia adopted sweeping new legislation allowing reservists to guard fuel and energy facilities, authorizing temporary internet blackouts in areas under attack and increasing penalties for sabotage.
The laws reflect the Kremlin’s expectation of a long war in which Ukrainian drones and covert operations continue to pose a significant threat far from the front line. Russian officials also claimed to have intercepted or destroyed hundreds of Ukrainian drones in recent days, including more than 200 in a single night, though these figures cannot be independently verified.
The human toll of this week’s escalation goes far beyond the headline figures from Ternopil. In addition to the dozens killed and more than 100 injured in that single strike, Ukrainian authorities report that Russian attacks in southern regions earlier in the week killed at least four civilians and wounded several others, while the strikes on Kharkiv and Dnipropetrovsk linked to the Izmail incident added another five dead and 13 injured.
The UN now estimates that more than 12,000 civilians have been killed since the full-scale invasion began, a number that is likely an undercount given the difficulties of gathering information from occupied territories.
Ukrainian officials warn that sustained attacks on heating and electricity networks as winter sets in could generate a secondary wave of casualties among vulnerable populations.
Amid the violence, diplomatic maneuvering has accelerated, albeit in deeply contentious ways. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky traveled to Turkey this week to discuss a new push for peace talks, vowing to use the latest mass strikes as evidence in appeals for greater air-defense support at the UN Security Council.
At the same time, Western media reported that US and Russian officials have quietly drafted a 28-point proposal that would require Ukraine to cede occupied territories and accept strict limits on its armed forces in exchange for a ceasefire — terms that Ukrainian officials and many analysts immediately described as a blueprint for capitulation and future renewed aggression.
Moscow has shown no sign of softening its core demands that Kyiv renounce NATO membership and withdraw from four regions Russia claims to have annexed, while Ukraine insists it will not accept the loss of its sovereign territory.
On the military-aid front, however, Kyiv did secure fresh promises. During a visit to Paris, Zelensky and French President Emmanuel Macron signed a letter of intent for the future purchase of up to 100 Rafale fighter jets over the next decade, alongside shorter-term deliveries of drones, guided missiles, radars and air-defense systems.
Paris also highlighted plans for joint production of interceptor drones and potential future co-production of Rafale components in Ukraine, positioning the deal as part of a broader effort to build up Ukraine’s domestic defense industry. In Spain, Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez announced a new €615 million military aid package that includes funding for additional defensive equipment under EU security-cooperation mechanisms.
Zelensky has hinted that more European support packages and an “important agreement for military capabilities” are expected before the end of November, although the precise content and timing remain to be seen.
Compiled by Ana Dumbadze
