Artillery shells sit on the ground ground next to destroyed Russian military vehicles on a field not far of southern city Mykolaiv on Sunday.

Artillery shells sit on the ground ground next to destroyed Russian military vehicles on a field not far of southern city Mykolaiv on Sunday. / AFP via Getty Images

As the weekend draws to a close in Kyiv and in Moscow, here are the key developments:

Ukrainian officials said 23 people were injured after a Russian rocket struck Chortkiv in the Ternopil region of western Ukraine. "There was no tactical or strategic sense in this strike, as in the vast majority of other Russian strikes," Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on Sunday. "This is terror, just terror."

The family of a 48-year-old British man detained by Russian-backed rebels called for his release on Saturday after he was sentenced to death in a trial in the separatist-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic of Ukraine. Shaun Pinner, who has lived in Ukraine for four years, served in the division defending Mariupol before it fell to Russian forces. Another Briton and a man from Morocco were also sentenced to death in what Pinner's family described as a "show trial."

Russian forces are using more deadly, inaccurate ordinance as munitions run low, Ukrainian and U.K. officials said Saturday. With modern munitions in short supply, Russia has resorted to using old anti-ship missiles designed to take out aircraft carriers. However, the munitions are highly inaccurate and can cause extreme collateral damage.

A former British soldier was killed fighting in eastern Ukraine. Jordan Gatley, a former rifleman in the British army, was fighting on the front lines in Severodonetsk in Ukraine's Donbas region. Both Ukrainian and Russian forces have suffered heavy casualties during intense fighting around Severodonetsk, a key city that Russia wants to capture.

In-depth

Russia has achieved at least one of its war goals: returning Ukrainian water to Crimea.

Evgenia Kara-Murza, wife of jailed Russian opposition politician Vladimir Kara-Murza, told NPR on Saturday that she has not had direct contact with him in two months.

Open source intelligence methods are being used to investigate war crimes in Ukraine.

Earlier developments

You can read more recaps here. For context and more in-depth stories, you can find NPR's full coverage here. Also, listen and subscribe to NPR's State of Ukraine podcast for updates throughout the day.

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