Russian strikes kill four near Kyiv as Zelensky visits Serbia and drone hits Bulgarian pipeline

Russian drone and missile strikes on the Kyiv region early on Saturday killed at least four people, including a child, Ukrainian officials said, as Moscow continued its near-daily bombardment of the capital and surrounding areas. The attacks came as Volodymyr Zelensky made a landmark visit to Belgrade, where he warned that Ukraine faces another winter with virtually no intact thermal power plants after systematic Russian targeting of energy infrastructure.

Speaking alongside Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic, Zelensky said Russian missiles were aimed precisely at making Ukrainian lives unbearable during the cold months. The visit marks a delicate diplomatic moment for Serbia, which has refused to join Western sanctions against Moscow while maintaining ties with Kyiv.

Ukraine strikes Russian refineries

Kyiv pressed its own long-range campaign overnight, hitting two Russian oil refineries. The Ilsky refinery in Krasnodar region and the Syzran refinery in Samara region both caught fire, according to Ukrainian military officials and Russian regional governors. Ukraine's general staff said the strikes aim to deprive Russia of resources to fund its military. A fire at Ilsky was later extinguished, with local authorities blaming debris from a Ukrainian drone.

Drone explosion rattles Bulgaria

Earlier on Saturday, an explosives-laden drone crashed in Bulgaria about 100 metres inside the border with Romania, exploding roughly 200 metres from a Romanian compressor station and one kilometre from Bulgaria's compressor station on the Trans-Balkan gas pipeline. Prime Minister Rumen Radev said the drone was not detected while crossing either Romanian or Bulgarian airspace. There were no casualties or structural damage.

We can say with certainty that the Ukrainian Armed Forces did not intentionally direct any assets toward Bulgaria.

Bulgaria's defence ministry said preliminary analysis showed the drone was of a type widely used by Ukraine's military, but added that nothing suggested a deliberate incident. Sofia has summoned the Ukrainian ambassador for Monday and announced it will redeploy anti-drone capabilities from the Turkish border to the Romanian frontier. Both Bulgaria and Romania are NATO and EU members.

Black Sea tensions rise

Turkey's foreign minister Hakan Fidan called for a moratorium on attacks by both Russia and Ukraine in the Black Sea after a series of strikes on civilian ships. He proposed a mechanism to declare such a pause. Meanwhile, Russia's defence ministry claimed a drone struck a cargo ship carrying weapons for Ukrainian forces east of Odesa on August 7, a report Reuters could not independently verify.

As winter approaches, Ukraine's degraded air defences and decimated thermal generation capacity leave cities vulnerable to sustained Russian pressure. The Bulgarian incident underscores the risk of spillover into allied territory, while Zelensky's Belgrade trip tests whether Serbia can maintain its unique position between Moscow and the West.