These are the key developments on day 1,119 of Russia’s war on Ukraine.
Here is the roundup of key events on Wednesday, March 19.
Fighting
Ukraine has announced that the number of Russian soldiers killed and wounded since the war began more than three years ago stands at about 897,010. This includes 1,560 servicemen killed or injured in the past 24 hours.
Russia has bombarded Ukraine with 137 drone attacks, leaving about 3,000 people without electricity following damage to critical infrastructure, said the governor of Zaporizhia region, Ivan Fedorov. The governor of neighbouring Dnipropetrovsk, Serhiy Lysak, said the barrage resulted in a fire at another infrastructure facility.
The Ukrainian Air Force said it shot down 63 of the 137 Russian drones, while Russia’s Ministry of Defence said it neutralised 46 Ukrainian drones overnight.
Russia’s Defence Ministry said some 200 Ukrainian fighters with five tanks, armoured combat vehicles and three demolition vehicles attempted an unsuccessful ground assault on the Belgorod region.
Ukraine’s military has also accused Russia of attempting a cross-border attack, saying its forces “successfully halted all attempts by the occupiers to secure a foothold” in the Sumy region.
The AFP news agency reports explosions and air raid sirens in the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv, after Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered a 30-day halt on attacks targeting Ukrainian energy infrastructure.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Russia launched more than 40 drones that hit civilian infrastructure, including a hospital in the Sumy region.
Politics and diplomacy
The phone call between United States President Donald Trump and Putin was a “historic” and “epic” moment, Moscow’s international cooperation envoy Kirill Dmitriev said on X. “Under the leadership of President Putin and President Trump, the world has become a much safer place today!” he wrote.
In the talks, Putin reportedly agreed to a “limited” 30-day pause in fighting, and for Ukraine and Russia to stop attacking each other’s energy sector, which was followed by a corresponding order by Putin to his military in Moscow.
According to the Kremlin, Putin also told Trump that the US and its allies must end all military assistance including foreign intelligence to Ukraine for the hostilities to end. The Kremlin also demanded that for the ceasefire to work, Ukraine must not be allowed to rearm. However, Trump told Fox News that aid to Ukraine was not discussed in his phone call with Putin.
It was also revealed that Russia and Ukraine will be exchanging 175 prisoners each on Wednesday.
Despite Moscow’s demands to stop military and intelligence assistance to Kyiv, German and French leaders said they would continue military support to Ukraine.
Following the call between both presidents, the White House said negotiations on a “full ceasefire” and “permanent peace” in Ukraine are set to begin “immediately” in the Middle East.
Zelenskyy said Ukraine would support the proposal to halt attacks on energy infrastructure but added that he hoped to speak with Trump for more details regarding Trump’s phone call with Putin before Ukraine gives a final answer.
Zelenskyy also accused the Kremlin of not intending to end its invasion of Ukraine and said Russia’s “whole game is to weaken” Ukraine. “They are not ready even for the first step, which is a ceasefire,” Zelenskyy said.
Democratic lawmakers in the US called on Trump to restore funding for a previously government-sponsored initiative led by Yale University’s Humanitarian Research Lab (Yale HRL) that tracked the mass deportation of Ukrainian children. They also claimed that data from the repository may have been permanently deleted, which would result in “devastating consequences”.
Reuters news agency reported that Ukraine had bought 100 million cubic metres of US liquefied natural gas (LNG) via an agreement between Ukraine’s state energy firm Naftogaz and Poland’s Orlen.
Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni said that the United Kingdom and France’s plan to send peacekeepers to Ukraine is likely ineffective. Instead, Meloni believes a better solution would be to extend NATO’s mutual defence umbrella.
President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen announced a new joint task force with Ukraine that would streamline the procurement of military supplies and consolidate support.