This week — what changed

• A ninth consecutive night of Russian strikes killed at least three people across Odesa, Dnipro and Kyiv, and a drone hit the headquarters of Ukraine's Security Service in Kyiv directly. The SBU building is a first on this map's record: the campaign has been hitting energy infrastructure, residential blocks and logistics, and a direct strike on the internal-security headquarters of the state is a different target class. (KSAT/AP, Ukrinform, Kyiv Independent, Euronews) 2026-09-04
• Overnight into 09-05, Russia struck Kyiv's own airports — Zhulyany and Boryspil — in a barrage of ballistic missiles and 167 drones across 23 locations, after rejecting Ukraine's unilateral offer of a halt to hostilities for the envoys' visit. Zelensky called the airport strikes "deliberate... for the first time in a long while," tying the target choice to discussion of where the US envoys might land. At least seven killed nationwide (five in Kamianske, Dnipropetrovsk Oblast; two in Kherson Oblast) and 51 injured. Dated to the night of 09-04/05; the envoys' arrival in Moscow and the Kremlin's announced pause belong to 09-05 and are in that day's digest. (Kyiv Independent — airports, Kyiv Independent — casualties) 2026-09-04
• Overnight into 09-05, before any pause took effect, Russia struck Kyiv's Zhulyany and Boryspil airports directly in a barrage of ballistic missiles and 167 drones across 23 locations, after rejecting Ukraine's unilateral offer of a 09-05 to 09-08 halt to hostilities for the envoys' visit. Zelensky: "deliberately, for the first time in a long while," calling them "Russian-Iranian Shaheds in response to American diplomacy" and tying the target choice to discussion of where the US envoys might land. At least seven killed nationwide — five in Kamianske, two in Kherson Oblast — and 51 injured. A tenth consecutive night. (Kyiv Independent — airports, Kyiv Independent — casualties, Kyiv Independent — Kamianske) 2026-09-05
• Witkoff and Kushner arrived in Moscow on Saturday for talks with Putin and remain scheduled to fly to Kyiv on Sunday 09-06 to meet Zelensky — what would be this administration's first envoy visit to Ukraine's capital — and the Kremlin announced that Putin has ordered no strikes on Kyiv for three days "starting at midnight tonight," tied explicitly to the Americans' meetings in Kyiv. The pause covers the city, not the country, and the nights ahead, not the one just past. Both halves are now dated expectations on the ledger: the visit on 09-06 and the pause through 09-08. By 15:00 ET the envoys had met Putin and neither side had issued a substantive readout; the Kyiv leg stood as scheduled with no new confirmation or slip, and the pause — midnight Moscow is 17:00 ET — had not yet begun, with nothing found reaffirming, conditioning or withdrawing Peskov's line since the morning. (UNN, quoting Peskov, Kyiv Post, CNN) 2026-09-05
• A localized ceasefire brokered by the IAEA took effect on Saturday around the damaged 330-kilovolt Ferosplavna-1 line at the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant, so that Ukrainian technicians could begin repairs after demining — the seventh such truce of the war, at a plant that has had no external power since 08-20 and has been cooling six reactors and its spent-fuel pools on diesel generators since. Director General Grossi said the plant is running low on diesel and faces a possible station blackout within days unless off-site power is restored or fuel can be brought through an active war zone; an IAEA team is monitoring the repair. The same day the Kremlin announced a three-day pause on Kyiv strikes, a narrower ceasefire was already in force five hundred kilometres to the south-east — and this map had not recorded the sixteen-day outage that made it necessary; the item was in Saturday's buffer under a finance-newsletter headline and reached the record on the finalize. (Ukrinform, carrying the IAEA statement, IAEA Update 365) 2026-09-05
• The Kremlin's pause on strikes against Kyiv took effect at midnight Moscow time and held for the city through its first night, while Russia launched 108 drones and missiles at the rest of Ukraine from 18:00 and killed at least nine — Kharkiv four, Kherson three, Zaporizhzhia one, Mykolaiv one, 68 injured, 82 drones and six Banderol missiles intercepted, no hits reported inside Kyiv despite an alert and fires in the oblast. The night straddles the digest-day boundary and is carried in full on the 09-06 digest and Russia-Ukraine War; it is here because the pause's first test fell inside Saturday's window and passed in the exact shape Peskov stated — the capital, not the country. (Kyiv Independent, Ukrinform) 2026-09-05
• Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner arrived in Kyiv on Sunday by train from Rzeszów, Poland, and walked with Zelensky from the railway station to St Sophia's Square — the first visit to Ukraine's capital by this administration's envoys, a day after roughly three hours with Putin in Moscow. Zelensky posted that "the negotiations have begun"; the White House said the sides "discussed substantive plans for next steps, which will be announced in the coming weeks," and a US official called the atmosphere "positive." No substantive readout from either capital of what Moscow offered or Kyiv answered; reported agenda items are Ukraine's winter energy needs under the strike campaign, security guarantees and post-war terms. The ledger item for the visit resolves as a hit on the day; the Saturday Moscow meeting still has no readout beyond Ryabkov's "realities on the ground." (Kyiv Independent, CNN, Ukrinform) 2026-09-06
• Steve Witkoff told a Kyiv press conference on Sunday afternoon that "we made significant progress in Moscow — we heard new ideas," and that trilateral US-Ukraine-Russia negotiations, which Zelensky had raised, "we hope will be announced shortly," while Jared Kushner called Saturday's Kremlin meeting "very constructive and substantive" and named a return to the trilateral format as the objective: "we've spoken to both sides, so hopefully very soon." British, French and German national security advisers joined the Ukrainian side for a further round; Kushner said the team is in near-daily contact with Umerov, Budanov, Arakhamia and Kyslytsya. Zelensky said territorial questions can only be settled at the leaders' level and that "at the moment" the war looks likely to continue into winter; asked whether it could end before then, Kushner said "we will try... that doesn't mean we will achieve it." The Kremlin's Ushakov called the Moscow talks "highly useful" and "extremely frank," with the Americans putting forward "a number of ideas on possible routes to a settlement," undisclosed. Outside the two paused capitals, Ukraine's Air Force said it struck the Ryazan refinery overnight and Russia said it hit a Ukrainian cargo vessel in the Black Sea. (Kyiv Post, Al Jazeera, NPR) 2026-09-06
• The first night of the Kremlin's three-day pause on strikes against Kyiv held for the city — no hits reported inside Kyiv overnight despite an air-raid alert and fires in Kyiv Oblast — while Russia launched 108 drones and missiles at the rest of Ukraine from 18:00 on Saturday and killed at least nine. Ukraine's Air Force reported 82 drones and six Banderol cruise missiles intercepted; the dead were in Kharkiv (four), Kherson (three), Zaporizhzhia (one) and Mykolaiv (one) oblasts, 68 injured, damage in seven more regions. The capital and not the country is exactly the shape Peskov stated, and the ledger item through 09-08 tests the next two nights. (Kyiv Independent, Ukrinform) 2026-09-06

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