Four years into its full-scale invasion, Russia controls about 20% of Ukrainian territory, where an estimated 3 million to 5 million people live. Life in shattered cities and villages alike remains difficult, with residents facing problems with housing, water, power, heat and health care. Across the illegally annexed regions of Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia, Russian citizenship, language and culture has been forced upon residents, including in school lesson plans and textbooks. Some say they live in fear of being accused of sympathizing with Ukraine. Many have been imprisoned, beaten and killed, according to human rights activists.

Days before the leaders of Russia and the U.S. hold a summit meeting in Alaska, Moscow's forces breached Ukrainian lines in a series of infiltrations this week in the country's industrial heartland of Donetsk. The advances amount to only a limited success for Russia, since Moscow still needs to consolidate its gains before achieving a true breakthrough. Still, some observers say it's a potentially dangerous moment. Analyst Mykola Bieleskov says Russian President Vladimir Putin will likely try to persuade U.S. President Donald Trump to pressure Kyiv by arguing the 3 1/2-year-old war is going badly for Kyiv.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy says that Russian President Vladimir Putin wants Ukraine to withdraw from the remaining 30% of the Donetsk region that Ukraine controls as part of a ceasefire deal. Zelenskyy reiterated that Ukraine would not withdraw from territories it controls because it was unconstitutional and would only serve as a springboard for a future Russian invasion. Zelenskyy said Putin wants the remaining 9,000 square kilometers (3,500 square miles) of Donetsk under Kyiv's control, where the war's toughest battles are grinding on, as part of a ceasefire plan. Doing so would hand Russia almost the entirety of the Donbas, a region comprising Ukraine's eastern industrial heartland that Putin has long coveted.

Russia is asking how Ukraine could attend potential talks on ending their three-year war when a Ukrainian decree from 2022 rules out negotiations with President Vladimir Putin. A Kremlin spokesman noted Wednesday that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy "is still legally prohibited from negotiating with the Russian side." The spokesman also said Zelenskyy's current readiness to negotiate peace with Russia as soon as possible is "positive." Ukraine's government did not immediately comment. The United States seeks to pressure Zelenskyy into negotiating an end to the war as its stance shifts sharply under the Trump administration.

Ukraine's military intelligence agency and the Pentagon say some North Korean troops have been killed during combat against Ukrainian forces in Russia's Kursk border region. These are the first reported casualties since the U.S. and Ukraine announced North Korea has sent 10,000 to 12,000 troops to Russia to help it in the almost 3-year war. The Ukrainian agency said Monday that around 30 North Korean troops were killed or wounded over the weekend during battle in Kursk, where Russia has for four months been trying to quash a Ukrainian incursion. The Pentagon press secretary says some North Korean troops have died in combat but didn't have a specific number of those killed or wounded.

Ukrainian commanders and soldiers say some new troops refuse to fire at the enemy. Others struggle to assemble weapons or to coordinate basic combat movements. A few have even walked away from their posts, abandoning the battlefield altogether. The commanders made the comments to The Associated Press as Ukraine is losing precious ground along the country's eastern front. The commanders blame the erosion in part on poorly trained recruits drawn from a recent mobilization drive, as well as Russia's clear superiority in ammunition and air power. The recently conscripted Ukrainians are a far cry from the battle-hardened fighters who flocked to join the war in the first year of the full-scale invasion.

Civilians with small children in their arms and lugging heavy suitcases are fleeing Ukraine's eastern city of Pokrovsk, where the Russian army is bearing down fast despite a lightning Ukrainian incursion into Russia's Kursk region. Local authorities said Russian forces are advancing so quickly that families must leave the city and other nearby towns and villages from Tuesday. Around 53,000 people still live in Pokrovsk, officials say, and some decided to get out while they could as Russia's army menaces. People of all ages hastened to leave the city, boarding trains and buses with the belongings they could carry. Some wept as they waited to depart, and soldiers helped the elderly with their bags. Pokrovsk is one of Ukraine's main defensive strongholds.

Russia has declared a "federal-level" emergency in the Kursk region following a large-scale incursion from Ukraine and sent reinforcements there. The announcement came four days after hundreds of Ukrainian troops poured across the border in what appeared to be Kyiv's biggest attack on Russian soil since the war began. Authorities in eastern Ukraine meanwhile said a Russian plane-launched missile hit a shopping mall late in the morning on Friday. At least 14 people were killed and 44 others were wounded. The mall is located in a town's residential area. Thick black smoke rose above it after the strike. Donetsk regional chief said it was "another act of terror by the Russians."

Russian forces have launched new deadly attacks on Ukraine, killing at least nine people a day before a high-profile meeting where leaders of countries that are some of Ukraine's biggest backers are to discuss how to slow Moscow's offensive. Ukrainian authorities say that along with the nine killed, 29 people were wounded when Russian missiles hit an apartment block in Kryvyi Rih, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy's hometown, on Wednesday. He says the strike has again proven the need for the West to help strengthen Ukrainian air defenses. Zelenskyy has repeatedly appealed to Kyiv's Western partners to provide more air defense systems, and the United States has agreed to send another Patriot missile system,