The Ukrainian military says it has regained control of nine settlements in the eastern part of the country where fighting has been most active.

The Air Assault Forces said in a report on Tuesday that the liberated areas include seven settlements in the Dnipropetrovsk region and two in the Zaporizhzhia region, and that approximately 480 sq km of territory on Oleksandrivka axis has been regained.

The battlefield report added that three other settlements have been cleared of Russian forces, and stabilisation efforts are currently underway in those areas.

According to the military units in the region, Russian forces are increasing their use of drones for reconnaissance and strikes against Ukraine’s logistics and positions.

Ukrainian units are responding to this offensive by applying pressure and prevent Russian forces from stabilising the line of contact or achieving their objectives in the area.

Hungary’s centre-right Tisza party widened its lead over ​prime minister Viktor Orban’s ruling Fidesz ahead of the parliamentary election on 12 April, two opinion polls ‌showed yesterday, although a large share of voters remained undecided.

Veteran nationalist Orban faces the biggest challenge to his rule in 16 years, although the outcome of the election remains uncertain due to the many undecided voters.

His opponent, Peter Magyar, ​has said his ​party would curb corruption, unlock ⁠billions of euros in frozen European Union funds to boost the economy, and firmly anchor Hungary in the EU and Nato.

While most polls have shown a ​Tisza lead, Fidesz points to other surveys that still show it on course ​to victory, ⁠though its opponents say these have mainly been conducted by institutes with financial or personal ties to the ruling party.

But even if Magyar wins the elections, he is unlikely to represent the pro-Ukrainian alternative Brussels is hoping for.

Magyar often sounds strikingly similar to Orban when it comes to Ukraine. He has opposed fast-tracking Ukraine’s EU membership, said he would deny military help to Kyiv, and signalled he would put Ukraine’s EU accession to a referendum – which could derail the process entirely.

Volodymyr Zelensky has said Russia responded to his offer for a temporary ceasefire over Easter with airstrikes and drone attacks.

“Russia is responding [to the Easter ceasefire offer] with Shahed drones and continues its terrorist operations against our energy sector, against our infrastructure,” he said, adding that he had discussed ways of advancing diplomacy with US negotiators.

“A silence over Easter could be exactly the signal that tells everyone that diplomacy can be successful,” he said.

Moscow said that it was looking for peace and not just a brief ceasefire. Russia’s foreign ministry also rejected Zelensky’s Easter truce proposal as a PR stunt.

Donald Trump has threatened to stop supplying weapons for Ukraine if his European allies do not join his “coalition of the willing” to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, people aware of the discussions said.

Trump has demanded that Nato countries deploy their navies to help him reopen the Strait, through which a fifth of the world’s oil passes and where traffic is now halted by Iran, reported the Financial Times.

At least three officials aware of the discussions said that Trump dangled the threat of ending the weapons supply for Ukraine under PURL, a Nato-led weapons procurement initiative for Ukraine.

European nations have resisted Trump’s push and said the Iran conflict was “not our war”.

The Nato secretary general, Mark Rutte, urged a group of key European nations who are Ukrainian allies – France, Germany and the UK – to release a statement that they are ready for any appropriate measures.

“We express our readiness to contribute to appropriate efforts to ensure safe passage through the Strait [of Hormuz],” the statement read.

“It was Rutte who insisted on the joint statement because Trump had threatened to withdraw from Purl and from Ukraine in general. The statement was then quickly put together, and other countries joined in afterwards because there was not enough time to invite everyone to sign up straight away,” an official aware of the discussions told FT.com.

The Russian defence ministry said on Wednesday that its forces had taken full control of the Luhansk region in eastern Ukraine, suggesting they had wrested control of ‌a small sliver of land which had remained beyond their reach since 2022.

A Ukrainian military spokesperson said there had been no battlefield changes in the area in the last six months.

More than 99 per cent of Luhansk, one of four Ukrainian regions Russia claimed as its ⁠own in 2022 – something Kyiv and most Western countries have rejected as an illegal land grab – has long been under Russian control.

“Units of the ‘West’ military grouping have completed the liberation of the Luhansk People’s Republic,” the defence ministry said in a statement, using Moscow’s preferred name for the region.

Luhansk is one of two regions – along with Donetsk – which make up the wider industrialised Donbas area.

The Kremlin on Wednesday reiterated its demand that Ukrainian forces withdraw from the part of Donetsk which Moscow does not control to end ‌what it ⁠called the “hot phase” of the war, a demand Kyiv has repeatedly dismissed as absurd.

Ukrainian drone interceptors and military expertise are ⁠delivering results in the Middle East, President Volodymyr ⁠Zelensky ​said ⁠on Wednesday.

Zelensky said that ⁠Ukraine was ​already ⁠cooperating with Saudi ‌Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, ‌Qatar, and ‌Jordan, and was also in contact ⁠with Bahrain, Kuwait, and Iraq.

The government team was also in talks on ‌potential engagements ​with Turkey and ‌several ⁠other countries, he ⁠said.

Finnish President Alexander Stubb told U.S. President Donald Trump in a ⁠phone call on Wednesday that “a more European NATO” was taking shape and that Europe was “shouldering ⁠responsibility”, ​Stubb’s office said ⁠in an emailed statement.

Trump told Reuters ⁠on Wednesday he intended ​to ⁠say in an address ‌to the nation later that he was considering ‌withdrawing the U.S. from ‌the NATO military alliance.

“Constructive discussion and exchange of ideas ⁠on NATO, Ukraine and Iran. Problems are there to be solved, pragmatically,” Stubb wrote in a social media post.

President Volodymyr Zelensky criticised Russia for answering his offer of an Easter truce with airstrikes on Wednesday but he praised the “positive” fresh talks with US mediators aimed at resolving the war.

He held talks remotely on Wednesday with US special envoy Steve Witkoff, Jared Kushner – President Donald Trump’s son-in-law – ⁠and US Senator Lindsey Graham as part of ongoing efforts to end the conflict.

In his nightly video address after the call, Zelensky thanked America for its efforts to bring peace and said the Ukrainian and US teams had agreed to strengthen a document outlining US ⁠security guarantees for any future peace deal.

“This is precisely what could ​pave ⁠the way for a reliable end to the war,” Zelensky said.