Russia's Deadliest Day: 32 Killed in Kramatorsk Strike

Russia unleashed one of its deadliest single-day assaults on Ukraine on October 8, with a drone strike tearing through the center of Kramatorsk and killing 32 people. Hours earlier, strikes on Kyiv had already killed four and wounded eighteen, including a drone that slammed into a shop in the Solomyansky district. The violence reached far beyond the capital. Russian long-range artillery fired four shells into Sumy, killing one person and wounding four, two of them children. In Zaporizhzhia, a Russian drone wounded five people, also including two children, while a separate FPV drone struck the regional council building, showing that government offices, not only homes, are being targeted. Against that backdrop, diplomacy pressed ahead. President Zelensky said European partners would join Ukraine's negotiating team for talks in the United States on October 9 and 10. Britain pledged £54 million to help Ukraine get through the winter, and the defense ministry reported that troops equivalent to two or three brigades had returned to service under a simplified amnesty for soldiers who had gone absent without leave. Elsewhere, student protests in France turned violent in Paris, where almost 500 people were detained, and Donald Trump promised there would be no US strike on Iran before November's midterm elections.