Russia’s heavy bombardment of Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, showed Moscow was “banking on escalation rather than negotiation”, Friedrich Merz, the German chancellor, said on Thursday. Peter Beaumont writes that Kyiv bore the brunt of the day’s almost continuous heavy attacks on Ukraine. Emergency services said at least 16 people, including two children, were killed in the capital. The mayor, Vitali Klitschko, declared Friday a day of mourning.

Russia had launched 1,567 drones since the start of Wednesday, said the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy. At least 22 civilians were killed over Wednesday and Thursday, officials said. It comes after Vladimir Putin, Russia’s president, said on Saturday that the war was “coming to an end”. Zelenskyy said on Thursday: “These are definitely not the actions of those who believe the war is coming to an end.”

“Kyiv and its partners are ready for negotiations aimed at a just peace,” said Merz, the German chancellor. “Russia, for its part, is continuing the war.” While Ukraine and Europe “want to help end this terrible war as quickly as possible”, the Russian attacks “speak a different language” to that of Putin’s suggestions the war could be nearing an end. In what sounded like a very pointed rejection of Vladimir Putin’s suggestion that a former German chancellor, Gerhard Schröder, could act as a mediator between Russia and Europe, Merz said: “We Europeans decide for ourselves who speaks for us. No one else.”

More than 1,500 rescue workers were deployed across Ukraine to deal with the aftermath, including nearly 600 in Kyiv. Zelenskiy said 180 facilities had been damaged including more than 50 residential buildings. A UN vehicle came under fire from drones during a humanitarian mission in Kherson city. In Ukraine’s second-largest city, Kharkiv, 28 people, including three children, were wounded and civilian infrastructure was targeted, said Oleh Syniehubov, the regional governor. Ukraine’s energy ministry said electricity supplies in 11 regions had been disrupted. The strikes also targeted port infrastructure in the southern Odesa region and railways, officials said.

Latvia’s prime minister has resigned after her government collapsed over the issue of Ukrainian drones straying into Latvian territory from Russia. Jon Henley writes that Evika Siliņa lost her governing coalition majority after forcing out her defence minister, Andris Sprūds, who resigned after Silina said the defence sector had “failed to fulfil its promise of safe skies over our country”. MPs from Sprūds’s party then quit the coalition and collapsed the government. Ukraine says the drones – intended for Russian targets – are driven over the border into Latvia by Russian electronic warfare.

The UN nuclear watchdog on Thursday warned of “intensified” military activities near several Ukraine nuclear sites that posed significant safety risks. The IAEA named the Khmelnitsky, Rivne and South Ukraine operational nuclear plants and the Chornobyl disaster site. There had been “a major increase in drone activity with more than 160 UAVs recorded flying in the vicinity of the sites”, the IAEA said, and “director general [Rafael] Grossi expressed deep concern about such military activities”. Grossi urged “all parties to exercise maximum restraint”.

Ukrainian drone attacks killed one person and injured three on Thursday in Russia’s Belgorod border region, a frequent target of Ukrainian strikes aimed at military sites. The region’s general headquarters said a drone hit a private house in the town of Graivoron near the border, killing a man. A second man was injured. In a second incident, a drone detonated in a village near the border, injuring two people, authorities said. The governor of Belgorod region was one of two regional officials to leave their posts on Wednesday. Vladimir Putin appointed Alexander Shuvaev, a highly decorated veteran, as acting governor.

Ukraine’s anti-corruption court on Thursday ordered the arrest on money-laundering charges of Andriy Yermak, a close ally of Volodymyr Zelenskyy and former head of his administration. The court set bail at 140 million hryvnias (US$3.19m), which would allow Yermak, who has denied the allegations against him, to be released pending a final ruling in his case.