Russia claims capture of another village in eastern Ukraine

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) - Russia said Saturday its forces had captured the village of Berezivka in their latest breakthrough in eastern Ukraine's Donetsk region, where Ukrainian defenses are creaking.

Ukrainian officials did not immediately comment.

Russia's much larger army has conducted a sustained yearlong campaign along the eastern front, gradually loosening the short-handed and weary Ukrainian forces' grip on its strongholds as the war approaches its fourth year later this month.

Though only a small settlement, the capture of Berezivka would advance Russia's sweep across the Donetsk region, which has cost Moscow heavily in troops and equipment but has paid dividends for the Kremlin. In the offensive, Russian forces crush settlements with the brute force of 3,000-pound (1,300-kilo) glide bombs, artillery, missiles and drones, then send in infantry units to attack the exposed defenders.

Russia seeks to take control of all parts of Donetsk and neighboring Luhansk, which together make up Ukraine's Donbas industrial region.

Kyiv’s recent losses in eastern Ukraine coincided with uncertainty over whether the United States will keep providing vital military aid. U.S. President Donald Trump, who says he is making American interests his priority, this week said he would likely meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin soon to negotiate a peace deal over Ukraine.

Speaking at the Munich Security Conference on Saturday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that Europe cannot rule out the possibility that "American might say no to Europe on issues that threaten it" and that the time has come for the creation of an "armed forces of Europe."

In other developments, radiation levels at Ukraine's Chernobyl nuclear plant - site of the world's worst nuclear accident - did not increase on Saturday, a day after a drone armed with a warhead hit the protective outer shell of the shuttered plant in the Kyiv region, according to Ukraine’s State Agency for Exclusion Zone Management.

The U.N. International Atomic Energy Agency said Friday that the strike, which punched a hole in the structure and briefly started a fire, did not breach the plant's inner containment shell.

Russia's Defense Ministry said that 40 Ukrainian drones were shot down overnight into Saturday in four regions of western and southwestern Russia. No casualties were reported.

Moscow sent 70 drones into Ukraine overnight into Saturday, Ukrainian officials said. According to Ukraine's air force, 33 drones were destroyed and 37 others were lost, likely having been electronically jammed.