Ukrainian air defenses shot down 61 of the 70 Shahed-type drones launched by Russia overnight, the Air Force reported. Nine drones were "lost" in Ukraine as a result of "active measures" by Ukrainian forces.

Putin war dead at 70,000 as claims Moscow couldn’t stop Kursk raid despite warning - Leaked documents reveal Russia’s failure to repel Ukraine’s Kursk incursion after months of warnings

The Russian president earlier this year rebuffed Defense Ministry officials who had tried to convince him they needed more soldiers.

Russian Defense Ministry officials are pressuring President Vladimir Putin to launch a new wave of mobilization, with increasing talk in Moscow about the inevitability of such a move, according to The Wall Street Journal.

British-Russian dissident Vladimir Kara-Murza who was freed from a Siberian penal camp in a historic prisoner swap last month believes that the fall of Vladimir Putin is "inevitable"

Exclusive: Key British-Russian opposition figure Vladimir Kara-Murza tells Tom Watling that even if he and other oppostition leaders are killed, many more will come in their place to challenge Putin

Armenia's prime minister said the CSTO, seen as Putin's NATO, "creates threats" for his country's future existence, after it pulled away from it.

A close ally of President Vladimir Putin warned Western governments on Thursday that a nuclear war would ensue if they gave the green light for Ukraine to use long-range Western weapons to strike targets deep inside Russia.

On Wednesday, the Kremlin condemned comments by outgoing NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg as “dangerous”, Reuters reports. Stoltenberg had suggested that allowing Ukraine to use Western long-range missiles to strike Russian territory would not trigger an escalation from Moscow.