Ukraine War Situation Update: 22 – 28 February 2025

Key trends

• In the Donetsk region, Russian forces occupied four settlements close to the Dnipropetrovsk region — three north and northwest of Velyka Novosilka and another southwest of Porkovsk. Russian forces also advanced in the northern part of the Donetsk region, bordering the Luhansk region.
• ACLED records 37 Russian long-range missile and drone strikes, including attacks on Kyiv city. Ukrainian forces intercepted strikes in at least 43 other instances in 14 regions, including the northern regions of Zhytomyr and Rivne.
• Russian shelling, missiles, and drones killed at least 31 civilians, mostly in the Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Kharkiv, Kherson, Kyiv, Odesa, and Sumy regions.

Spotlight: Russian forces launch new round of strikes on energy infrastructure across Ukraine

Following blackouts due to Russian attacks in the Odesa and Mykolaiv regions the week prior, Russian forces continued to target energy infrastructure across Ukraine last week. Overnight on 27-28 February, a salvo of over 200 Russian drones struck civilian infrastructure across the country,¹ including an unspecified energy facility in the Kharkiv region and gas pipelines in the Donetsk and Dnipropetrovsk regions. Earlier during the week, Russian drones hit an electrical substation in the Kharkiv region on 25 February and unspecified energy facilities in the Dnipropetrovsk and Odesa regions on 26 February, in addition to the damage to power lines recorded in several other regions. These attacks led to emergency blackouts in several regions, including Dnipropetrovsk, Cherkasy, Sumy, and Kyiv, as well as Kyiv city.²

Russia has been deliberately targeting Ukraine’s energy grid since October 2022 and began to increasingly focus on destroying power generation facilities since March 2024, causing significant hardship for civilians, as discussed in the latest ACLED report released ahead of the third anniversary of Russia’s all-out invasion. Amid the souring relationships between the newly-elected United States administration and Ukraine’s leadership,³ the US suspended initiatives that help restore Ukraine’s energy grid⁴ before cutting off all US military aid on 3 March, including that already en route to Ukraine.⁵ This may undercut Ukraine’s reconstruction efforts and air defense capabilities⁶ that allow Ukraine to maintain the functioning of its energy system despite constant Russian attacks.

Explore the ACLED Conflict Exposure tool to assess the numbers of people affected by armed violence, disaggregated by locations, time period, and actors involved.