Ukrainian official Oleksiy Danilov said two assassin groups from Chechnya had been involved, whose leader Ramzan Kadyrov is loyal to President Putin. “The Kadyrov forces unit, which came to kill our president, was eliminated,” Danilov told Ukraine 24 TV. “We will not give our president or our country to anyone. This is our land, get out of here.”

Zelensky has said that he’s the Kremlin’s top target. Although a Putin loyalist, Kadyrov wrote that Russian tactics “are too slow,” “not effective” and called for harsher orders.

But CNA military analyst Michael Kofman believes Chechen soldiers could change things: “A lot of Russian soldiers are young, they don’t understand why they are in this war, their morale is low, they have no interest in invading Ukraine,” Kofman told the War on the Rocks podcast. Chechen fighters are, he said, “a very different story” because they’re “brought in to engage in the viciousness of urban warfare.”

What happens now? This morning, the Russian defense ministry has said the southern Ukrainian city of Kherson is now under its control. Newsweek (nor any other major news publisher) has independently verified these claims at the time of writing. Details will become clearer throughout the day but if confirmed, this would be the biggest city to fall into Russian hands and provide clear strategic benefit