Drones struck Ukraine’s Izmail port area in the ⁠southern Odesa region overnight, local authorities said ⁠on ​the Telegram ⁠messaging app.

One of ⁠the drones ​became stuck ⁠in power lines, temporarily cutting off ‌electricity to five ‌villages, the post said.

Izmail, ⁠close to the Romanian border, is home to the largest Ukrainian port on ‌the Danube ​River and is ⁠a frequently ⁠targeted strategic location.

A drone hit a residential building in Romania’s city of Galati close to the ⁠border with Ukraine, with two people suffering minor injuries, the Romanian General Inspectorate for Emergency Situations said in a Facebook post on Friday.

The drone struck a 10th-floor apartment ⁠, starting a fire, the inspectorate ​said.

⁠A picture showed firefighters at the site and debris scattered on the ground.

It added ⁠that the drone’s entire explosive payload detonated and around ​70 ⁠people were evacuated.

In a separate incident, a drone ‌without an explosive charge was found around Basesti in Maramures county in northwestern Romania and the area was secured, ⁠TVR broadcaster said late on Thursday, citing local authorities.

The authorities were investigating the origin of the drone, which the report said had a wingspan of about 3m (9.84ft), and how it happened to be in the area, TVR added.

Ukraine’s parliament has ratified on Thursday a €90 billion (£77bn) loan agreement with the European Union with 298 votes, well ahead of the 226 votes required for a majority.

The financial aid, intended to bolster Kyiv’s defence against Russia, faced opposition from outgoing Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orban before his electoral defeat last month.

The EU is set to offer interest-free loans for 2026-2027, funded by its borrowing on capital markets and underpinned by the EU budget headroom.

Ukraine is not expected to pay the money back from its own funds, with the capital only due for repayment once Russia pays war reparations after the conflict is over.

Russia has central bank assets that are frozen in the EU which are worth around €210 billion and which could be used for the repayment.

The scheme was designed to effectively make use of the frozen Russian funds to help Ukraine without confiscating the money, a step that had been rejected as legally risky.

The €90 billion is to cover two-thirds of Ukraine’s needs for the next two years, estimated at €135 billion in total. Of the total, Ukraine will get €45 billion in 2026 and another €45 billion in 2027.

Volodymyr Zelensky has reportedly written an urgent letter to Donald Trump, warning of a critical shortage of Ukraine’s air defences.

Here’s everything you need to know in just five bullet points:

Russia’s Defence Ministry said on Thursday that its forces had taken control of the Ukrainian settlement of Novovasylivka in the eastern Kharkiv region, the state RIA Novosti news agency reported.

The Independent could not independently verify the battlefield report.

Russian defense systems were downing Ukrainian drones ⁠targeting energy and civil infrastructure ⁠in Russia’s ​Volgograd ⁠region, Interfax news ⁠agency said, ​citing Governor ⁠Andrei Bocharov.

An ‌apartment building was hit ‌but there ‌were no casualties, the ⁠governor said, citing preliminary data. Volgograd region is home to a large ‌refinery run ​by ‌Russian ⁠energy company ⁠Lukoil.

The US government should respond positively to President Volodymyr ​Zelensky’s request for more air defence missiles to shield Ukraine’s capital from a threatened escalation in Russian bombardment, two U.S. congressmen said on Thursday.

President Zelensky wrote to Donald Trump and the members of the ⁠US Congress this week to request additional Patriot systems and interceptors – the only effective shield against Russia’s ballistic missiles in Ukraine’s arsenal.

After meeting ⁠with Zelensky in Kyiv, Senator Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut said the United ​States ⁠had complied several times in the ‌past with Kyiv’s requests for additional weapons.

“My hope and expectation is that America will respond positively to this request,” said Blumenthal, speaking alongside US Representative ‌Jim Himes, a fellow Democrat.

Both congressmen, Blumenthal said, ‌would lobby on their return to Washington for additional air defence interceptors for Ukraine and tougher sanctions on Russia: “What we will regard as our mission, as we go back, is to ⁠make sure that Ukraine has the means to do the job.”

We can bring you more from Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova, who we heard from earlier.

She said that the number of drone attacks on Russian territory from the direction of Europe and Northern European states is increasing.

Moscow has made clear its concern Ukrainian drones could be using Baltic or other countries’ airspace to launch attacks on targets inside Russia.

But this assertion is rejected by Kyiv and the three Baltic countries.

The deployment of additional US military forces to Poland could lead to a “qualitative escalation” of the tension between Russia and the West, Moscow has said.

Russia may be forced to take retaliatory measures, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said on Thursday.

She didn’t specify exactly what these measures could entail.