Ukrainian forces struck Russia's Novorossiysk naval base overnight with drones, missiles and unmanned boats, President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Telegram on 13 August 2026, as the governor of the Krasnodar region confirmed a 'massive' wave of attacks killed at least two people, including an eight-year-old child.
Ukraine strikes Novorossiysk naval base; Zelensky reports 745 sq km recaptured in southeastern sector
Ukrainian forces struck Russia's Novorossiysk naval base overnight with drones, missiles and unmanned boats, President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Telegram on 13 August 2026, as the governor of the Krasnodar region confirmed a 'massive' wave of attacks killed at least two people, including an eight-year-old child.
The mayor of Novorossiysk, Andrei Kravchenko, said the city's water supply had been suspended following damage caused by the overnight drone strikes and that an emergency situation had been declared, according to Reuters. He said several educational facilities had also been damaged.
Two of Russia's biggest grain terminals at Novorossiysk suspended operations as a result of the strikes, industry sources told Reuters. Russia is the world's largest wheat exporter and ships most of those exports through Black Sea ports including Novorossiysk. Russia's main grain lobby group had warned the previous month that Ukrainian drone attacks could shut down Black Sea grain exports, potentially pushing up prices and causing food shortages in Africa and the Middle East.
The strikes on Novorossiysk came despite Ukraine reportedly agreeing to pause drone attacks on oil tankers using the port after a request from US Vice President JD Vance, according to the Financial Times, citing Ukrainian officials.
Separately, two attacks over the previous week targeted military assets in Gelendzhik, roughly 12 miles from Russian President Vladimir Putin's Black Sea residence. A further strike on Sunday hit an S-400 anti-aircraft missile system and launch pad approximately 500 metres from the site of an earlier attack. Major Robert Brovdi, commander of Ukraine's unmanned systems forces, said the S-400 had fired six missiles on Sunday night before being left, in his words, 'ablaze and sputtering for three hours.'
Zelensky also said Ukrainian forces had recaptured 745 square kilometres of territory in the southeastern Oleksandrivka sector since the start of the year. He said the operation, which Ukraine states began in January, had brought 26 settlements back under Ukrainian control across the Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk and Zaporizhzhia regions, and had been carried out 'with precision – exactly as planned.'
Ukrainian open-source monitoring group DeepState broadly aligned with those claims, having confirmed the recapture of 19 settlements and Ukrainian advances in six other areas. The reported gains refer specifically to the Oleksandrivka sector and not Ukraine's overall battlefield position. Russia continues to make advances elsewhere along the front, particularly in Donetsk, though analysts say its overall rate of territorial gain has slowed in 2026.
Zelensky told CNN that Ukraine needs 5 percent of US Patriot interceptor stocks to get through the winter and 10 percent to destroy all Russian ballistic missiles. He said Ukraine currently had 'two and a half times less interceptors than we had in 2025,' while Russia was firing twice as many ballistic missiles each month. He said Ukraine was receiving only '1 per cent' of US interceptor production and described ongoing efforts to increase that share: 'From 1 per cent to 5 per cent... I have some months and millions [of] phone calls and anything else. I do some things which I can't even share. It doesn't mean that it's out of the law. But I can't speak about it.'
Russia also launched an overnight attack on Ukraine's Danube port city of Izmail in the southern Odesa region, sparking fires and damaging port infrastructure, local authorities said on Thursday. Izmail hosts Ukraine's largest Danube River port and serves as a key export hub for grain and other commodities.
On Tuesday, Russia released American former Marine Robert Gilman, 32, a Massachusetts teacher, after four years of what his family and US officials allege was wrongful detention and abusive treatment. President Donald Trump said he had spoken with Putin about Gilman's release, describing it as being 'very much on a Humanitarian Basis,' and added that Russia had asked for nothing in return. Secretary of State Marco Rubio posted a photograph of Gilman on social media.
Earlier in the week, Zelensky said Russian forces used North Korean-supplied ballistic missiles in an overnight attack on the southeastern city of Zaporizhzhia, killing seven workers at a steel plant and injuring 21. He also said North Korea was preparing to deploy more troops to Russia. 'Every step Russia takes – increasing ballistic missile production, bringing in North Korean equipment, preparing for mobilisation – all of this shows that Moscow is preparing not for peace, but for escalation,' Zelensky said on social media.
A separate report indicated that Ukrainian drone strikes on Russian refineries had pushed Russian officials to import gasoline from India. Data and market intelligence provider Kpler said Russia received its first such shipment on 5 August from India's Nayara Energy Ltd, backed by Russian oil producer Rosneft. The transfers were made to Russia-linked tankers via shipments off Egypt, Bloomberg reported. Kpler lead analyst Sumit Ritolia said the imports highlighted 'the severity of the current domestic gasoline imbalance, and the extent to which lower refinery runs are reshaping Russia's traditional product trade flows.'
After speaking with Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan, Zelensky said relations between Ukraine and Armenia were becoming 'even more constructive' and stressed the importance of continuous dialogue. Armenia has increasingly distanced itself from traditional ally Russia under Pashinyan's government. Relations between Moscow and Yerevan have deteriorated since Russia did not prevent Azerbaijan's September 2023 offensive in Nagorno-Karabakh.
- Russia's official military or government response to the Novorossiysk naval base strike is not provided beyond regional and municipal officials' statements.
- The total number of Ukrainian drones and missiles launched in the Novorossiysk attack is not specified.
- The extent of damage to the naval base itself, as distinct from civilian infrastructure, is not independently confirmed.
- The basis on which analysts assessed that Russia's overall rate of territorial gain has slowed is not identified.
- The specific terms or scope of Ukraine's reported agreement with the US to pause drone strikes on oil tankers at Novorossiysk are not detailed.
- Russia's response to the allegation that it used North Korean missiles on Zaporizhzhia is not included.
- The conditions under which Robert Gilman was detained, and Russia's official account of his imprisonment, are not presented.
- The current total US Patriot interceptor stockpile and what 5 percent would represent in absolute numbers are not stated.
- India's Nayara Energy Ltd response to reporting about its gasoline shipments to Russia is not included.
- The source text supplied appears truncated; some material may be missing.
Read the original at The Independent