As Dnipropetrovsk closes, Moscow rejects a Black Sea truce
Zelenskyy closed Dnipropetrovsk with 26 settlements and 745 square kilometres recovered; ISW put 627. Patriot stocks ran out. As Izmail and Ust-Luga burned, Moscow rejected a Black Sea truce.
Geopolitics··Night
745 square kilometres and empty Patriots
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said the counteroffensive in the Dnipropetrovsk region had ended as planned. He said 26 settlements had been liberated and 745 square kilometres of the southern region recovered this year. The Institute for the Study of War, which assesses control from geolocated open-source material, put the recovery conservatively at 627 square kilometres. ISW also assessed Russia at a net loss of 233 square kilometres across the whole front this year. The open-source measure and the official area claim sit in the same file; the ballistic climb opens a separate line beside that gap. Vadym Skibitskyi, deputy head of Ukraine's military intelligence, said monthly ballistic and hypersonic launches rose from 61 in April to 107 in May, 134 in June and 198 in July. He added that Russia now builds more than 100 such missiles a month. Zelenskyy said Ukraine has run out of Patriot interceptors after receiving almost three times fewer from allies this year than in 2025. Ground gains and an empty interceptor stock sit side by side in the same week and narrow the defensive window.[1]
Izmail and Ust-Luga on the same night
Russia's defence ministry said its forces struck a railway station at the Danube port of Izmail, which it said was being used to load and move military cargo and fuel. It also reported hitting two tugboats off Mykolaiv. Leningrad Governor Alexander Drozdenko said a Ukrainian drone attack started a fire at the Ust-Luga oil export port on the Baltic. He added that the fire was brought under control with no casualties. Drozdenko also said more than 50 drones were shot down overnight around the St Petersburg region. In the Tver region, debris damaged the wall of a warehouse belonging to retailer Wildberries, whose facilities have been hit more than 20 times in the past month; no one was injured. According to TASS, aviation agency Rosaviatsia briefly restricted flights at airports around Moscow. Latvia said fighter jets shot down a drone that entered its airspace, while Finland temporarily restricted sea traffic in parts of the Baltic Sea. The fire at Ust-Luga was brought under control with no casualties; flights around Moscow and sea traffic in parts of the Baltic Sea were temporarily restricted. The strike on Izmail's railway station and the fire at the Ust-Luga oil export port were reported that night.[2]
Half-measure rejected on the Black Sea
Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova said Russia sees no grounds for half-measures that would only give Kyiv a temporary respite. Her remarks answered Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan's call on 8 August for a mechanism to declare a Black Sea ceasefire. Zakharova said Moscow had not received a formalised Turkish appeal through official channels setting out the conditions of the proposed moratorium. She also accused Ukrainian military drones of attacks on civilian vessels. Reuters reported that Ukraine had separately proposed a mutual halt to strikes on civilian targets in the Black Sea. The offer was passed to Moscow through intermediaries and a reply was awaited. Zakharova's reply, Fidan's call and Ukraine's separate offer still do not meet Black Sea truce language on common ground. The close of the Dnipropetrovsk operation, the Izmail and Ust-Luga night strikes and the rejection of a Black Sea truce as a half-measure show ground gains and maritime diplomacy failing to balance each other in the same week. Ground kilometres are rising while Black Sea truce language still finds no answer.[3], [1], [2]
