Nigeria's stock market is displaying contrasting trends, with weekly trading showing mixed performance while foreign investor participation has declined dramatically in recent months.

Weekly Market Performance Reveals Split Trends

The Nigerian Exchange concluded its latest trading week with conflicting signals. Market capitalization rose by 0.19 percent, gaining N130 billion to close at N68.751 trillion, up from the previous day's N68.621 trillion. This increase was primarily attributed to United Bank for Africa's additional shares listing on the NGX.

However, the All-Share Index painted a different picture, dropping 0.14 percent or 154.40 points to close at 109,028.62, down from 109,183.02. This marked the third consecutive daily loss for the index during the week.

Trading activity showed positive market breadth with 30 advancing stocks outpacing 22 declining ones. Red Star Express led the gainers, soaring 10 percent to close at N6.71, followed by University Press which climbed 9.82 percent to N4.36 per share. Other notable performers included ABC Transport (up 9.69 percent to N2.49) and McNicholas (rising 9.05 percent to N2.29).

On the downside, Northern Nigeria Flour Mills suffered the steepest decline, falling 9.97 percent to N118.70, while Transcorp Hotel dropped 9.95 percent to N138.50 per share.

The week's trading volume totaled 637.54 million shares worth N18.122 billion across 15,927 transactions, representing a decrease from the previous period's 1.65 billion shares valued at N19.098 billion in 26,176 transactions. Tantalizer dominated trading activity with 145.08 million shares worth N384.45 million.

Aruna Kebira, managing director of Globalview Capital Ltd., explained that the divergence between market capitalization and the All-Share Index resulted from UBA's rights issue of 6.8 billion units, which increased the bank's outstanding shares from 34.199 billion to 41.039 billion. He noted that investors are beginning to take profits, particularly on dividend-paying stocks.

Foreign Investment Sees Dramatic Decline

A more concerning trend has emerged in foreign investor participation, which plummeted by 90.9 percent in April 2025. Foreign transactions totaled just N63.07 billion (approximately $39.50 million), a sharp drop from March's N699.89 billion (about $455.41 million).

This dramatic decline contrasts with domestic investor activity, which showed resilience with a modest 0.8 percent increase to N418.97 billion in April, up from N415.62 billion in March. Domestic investors now account for 74 percent more transaction value than their foreign counterparts.

The Nigerian Exchange attributed the foreign investment decline to the absence of large block trades that had boosted March figures, along with ongoing concerns about foreign exchange volatility and repatriation challenges that continue to deter international investors.

Domestic Investors Drive Market Activity

The data reveals a clear shift toward domestic market dominance. Throughout 2024, local investors accounted for approximately 85 percent of total market transactions, while foreign participation represented only 15 percent. This trend has continued into 2025, with domestic transactions reaching N1.837 trillion compared to foreign transactions of approximately N877.12 billion.

Despite the month-on-month decline, April 2025 activity remained robust compared to the previous year, with total transactions rising 39.22 percent from April 2024's N346.23 billion. However, overall April activity fell 56.79 percent from March's N1.1155 trillion to N482.04 billion.

Within the domestic market, institutional investors maintained their edge over retail participants by 14 percent in April. While retail participation declined 8.02 percent to N181.31 billion, institutional activity grew 8.77 percent to N237.66 billion.

Long-term Growth Despite Recent Volatility

Looking at broader trends, both domestic and foreign investor activity have shown substantial growth over the past 18 years. From 2007 to 2024, domestic transactions increased 33.2 percent from N3.556 trillion to N4.735 trillion, while foreign transactions expanded 38.31 percent from N616 billion to N852 billion.

The improved domestic investor confidence appears driven by relative macroeconomic stability, attractive corporate earnings releases, and sustained institutional investor participation, suggesting underlying market strength despite recent foreign investment volatility.

UN says more food needed in Gaza as looting hampers deliveries

Israeli airstrikes killed at least six Palestinians guarding aid trucks against looters, Hamas officials said on Friday, as the head of the United Nations warned that only a "teaspoon" of aid was getting in following Israel's 11-week-long blockade.

The Israeli military said 107 trucks carrying flour and other foodstuffs as well as medical supplies entered the Gaza Strip from the Kerem Shalom crossing point on Thursday, for a total of 305 since Monday when the blockade was relaxed.

But getting the supplies to people sheltering in tents and other makeshift accommodation has been fitful and U.N. officials say at least 500 to 600 trucks of aid are needed every day.

So far, an umbrella network of Palestinian aid groups said, 119 aid trucks have got past the Kerem Shalom crossing point and into Gaza since Israel eased its blockade on Monday in the face of an international outcry.

Despite the relaxation of the blockade, distribution has been hampered by looting by groups of men, some of them armed, near the city of Khan Younis, an umbrella network representing Palestinian aid groups said.

"They stole food meant for children and families suffering from severe hunger," the network said in a statement, which also condemned Israeli airstrikes on security teams protecting the trucks.

The U.N. World Food Programme said 15 trucks carrying flour to WFP-supported bakeries had been looted, which it said reflected the dire conditions facing Gazans.

"Hunger, desperation and anxiety over whether more food aid is coming is contributing to rising insecurity," it said in a statement.

A Hamas official said six members of a security team tasked with guarding the shipments were killed.

Israel imposed the blockade in early March, accusing Hamas of stealing aid meant for civilians. Hamas rejects the charge, saying a number of its own fighters have been killed protecting the trucks from armed looters.

There was no immediate comment from the Israeli military, which generally considers all armed Palestinians as militants.

"Hamas constantly calls the looters 'guards' or protectors' to mask the fact that they're disturbing the aid process," a military official said.

'DESPERATION'

With most of Gaza's 2 million population squeezed into an ever narrowing zone on the coast and in the area around the southern city of Khan Younis by Israel's military operation, international pressure to get aid in quickly has ratcheted up.

"Without rapid, reliable, safe and sustained aid access, more people will die – and the long-term consequences on the entire population will be profound," said U.N. Secretary General Antonio Guterres.

A German government spokesperson said the aid was "far too little, too late and too slow," adding that delivery of supplies had to be increased significantly.

Israel has announced that a new system, sponsored by the United States and run by private contractors, will soon begin operations from four distribution centres in the south of Gaza, but many details of how the system will work remain unclear.

The U.N. has already said it will not work with the new system, which it says will leave aid distribution conditional on Israel's political and military aims.

Israel says its forces will only provide security for the centres and will not distribute aid themselves.

As the aid has begun to trickle in, the Israeli military has continued the intensified ground and air operation launched last week, which Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said would end with Israel taking full control of the Gaza Strip.

The military said it had conducted more strikes in Gaza overnight, hitting 75 targets, including weapons storage facilities and rocket launchers. Palestinian medical services said at least 25 people had been killed in the strikes.

Israel launched an air and ground war in Gaza after Hamas militants' cross-border attack on October 7, 2023, which killed some 1,200 people by Israeli tallies and saw 251 hostages abducted into Gaza.

The Israeli campaign has since killed more than 53,600 Palestinians, according to Gaza health authorities, and devastated the coastal strip. Aid groups say signs of severe malnutrition are widespread.

Reuters

WESTERN PERSPECTIVE

Kyiv mayor says Russian drones, missiles trigger fires, injure eight

Russia attacked Ukraine's capital Kyiv early on Saturday with drones and missiles, triggering fires, strewing debris in districts throughout the city and injuring at least eight people, the city's mayor said.

Reuters witnesses saw and heard successive waves of drones flying over Kyiv, and a series of explosions jolted the city.

Mayor Vitali Klitschko said two residents had required hospital treatment and that air defence units were in action.

Pictures posted online showed smoke billowing from the top of one block of flats and flames leaping from part of another as emergency crews trained water on it. An orange-red glow lit up the city as plumes of smoke wafted across the horizon.

Klitschko said fragments from one drone struck the top floor of an apartment building in the Solomynskyi district on the west bank of the Dnipro River, which bisects the city. One apartment building was on fire in the area as was one non-residential building.

Timur Tkachenko, head of Kyiv's military administration, said a fire had also broken out on two floors of an apartment building in Dniprovskyi district on the opposite bank.

Officials also reported a fire in Obolon in the city's northern suburbs and fallen debris on a shopping centre in the same area. They said drone fragments hit the ground in a number of other widely separated neighbourhoods.

An air alert remained in effect more than two hours after it was first declared.

The overnight strikes followed several days of Ukrainian drone attacks - some 800 attacks - on targets inside Russia, including capital Moscow.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov had vowed on Friday to respond to those attacks.

RUSSIAN PERSPECTIVE

Russian Army enters Yunakovka in Ukraine’s Sumy region — military expert

Russian forces have entered Yunakovka in Ukraine’s Sumy Region, from where Kiev used to move troops to the bordering Russian region of Kursk, military expert Andrey Marochko told TASS.

"According to information at my disposal, our troops have already entered the locality of Yunakovka, which served as a logistics hub for moving Ukrainian militants to the Kursk Region," he said.

On April 19, Marochko told TASS that Russian servicemen had expanded their fire control over a motor road between Yunakovka and Oleshnya that Kiev used for sending supplies to the Ukrainian battlegroup at this sector of the front line.

Reuters/Tass

A Chinese woman was allegedly forced to take off her heavy makeup after facial recognition scanners at an airport failed to confirm her identity.

A short clip showing a young woman using wet wipes to clean her face of makeup while being scolded by airport staff went viral on Chinese social media last week, sparking all sorts of humorous comments.

According to the boarding pass shown in the video next to the woman’s ID, the video was shot in September of last year, at Shanghai Airport, but only recently attracted attention online. During the short clip, the woman holding the camera (presumably an airport official), scolds the young girl, telling her that she needs to wipe off all the makeup until she looks like the picture on her identification document.

“Wipe everything off until you look like your passport photo. Why would you do your makeup like that? You are asking for trouble,” the voice behind the camera says.

It’s unclear whether the woman eventually passed the airport’s facial recognition scan, but her ordeal did inspire humorous comments on social media.

“It’s not like she was able to walk around with a filter on in real life, right?” one person asked.

Others took pity on the young woman, saying that she already looked embarrassed enough, and there was no woman for the airport official to nag her about the makeup, while others wondered whether the makeup should be an issue for modern facial recognition scanners.

“No matter how thick the makeup is, the face shouldn’t be unrecognizable, right? Isn’t it time to upgrade the equipment?” one person wondered.

We reported a similar incident a while back, when several Chinese women had problems entering the country after flying to South Korea for facial plastic surgery, which changed their look so much that they became unrecognizable.

Oddity Central

Maybe coffee doesn't need to be the very first step in our morning routines.

While it's often associated with wakefulness, experts claim there may be benefits to holding off on that cup of joe for a different time of day.

Cortisol, a stress hormone, is highest in our body right as we wake up, according to Julia Zumpano, a registered dietitian with the Cleveland Clinic Center for Human Nutrition.

From there, she said, it begins to decline naturally throughout the day.

Caffeine is a stimulant, so if it's consumed (by drinking coffee, for example) when cortisol is high, that can increase stress levels that were already high at the beginning of the day. 

Note the time delay

"The [cortisol] decline is different for everyone but typically occurs one-and-a-half to two hours after you wake," Zumpano said.

That's the best time to have coffee, Zumpano said.

That way, "you can rely on your body's natural alert system - cortisol - and when it declines, then you use caffeine to provide the boost."

"There is no specific time that's best to drink caffeine," the dietitian added. "[It's] based on when you wake and your natural rise and drop in cortisol."

Yet adhering to the body's natural wake-up processes can help sustain energy levels by avoiding one big cortisol, caffeinated crash.

Fox News Digital previously reported on smart ways to consume coffee, with an expert noting that coffee drinking should be tailored to each individual.

"For some people, waking up and having a glass of water to rehydrate and then having coffee works well – but for others the morning ritual of having a cup of coffee first thing upon awakening is just too good to give up," said Wendy Troxel, a Utah-based sleep expert and senior behavioral scientist at the RAND Corporation. 

"So, I think it's mostly a matter of personal preference."

Know when to cut it off

The ideal window may begin two hours after waking up, but how long do we have until we need to cut the coffee again before going to sleep?

"I typically suggest six to eight hours before bed, but some people are slow metabolizers of caffeine," Zumpano said. So "it may take longer for their bodies to excrete caffeine."

For those people, she suggests limiting consumption in the nine-to-12-hour window before bed.

"Coffee is high in antioxidants and can aid in alertness and wakefulness, although one should not be dependent on caffeine for this effect," she said.

"If you struggle with caffeine addiction, look at other lifestyle factors such as sleep duration and quality, nutrition, exercise, and timing and amount of caffeine consumption."

Fox News

New statistics from the UK Office for National Statistics reveal that Nigeria maintained its position as a major contributor to British immigration in 2024, with approximately 52,000 Nigerian nationals relocating to the country throughout the year.

The figures come amid a dramatic reduction in overall UK net migration, which plummeted by nearly half to 431,000 in the year ending December 2024, down from 860,000 the previous year—representing a decline of almost 50 percent.

Work and Study Drive Nigerian Migration

The data shows that Nigerian immigrants primarily arrived for employment and educational opportunities. Work-related visas accounted for 27,000 arrivals, while 22,000 came on study visas. The remaining 3,000 entered under various other immigration categories.

Nigeria's substantial contribution places it alongside India, Pakistan, and China as the leading sources of non-EU+ migration to the UK. Indian nationals topped the list as the most common non-EU+ immigrants during this period.

According to the ONS report, "Work and study-related immigration were the primary reasons for migration among Indian, Pakistani, and Nigerian nationals."

Demographics of New Arrivals

The migration data reveals key demographic patterns among non-EU+ immigrants. The vast majority—83 percent—fell within working age (16-64 years), with a relatively balanced gender split of 52 percent male and 48 percent female.

Children under 16 represented 16 percent of all migrants, while those over 65 accounted for just one percent of arrivals.

Factors Behind Overall Decline

While countries like Nigeria continued to send significant numbers of migrants to the UK, the broader downward trend in immigration resulted from multiple factors. Reduced arrivals on work and study visas from non-EU+ countries contributed to the decline, along with increased emigration rates.

The statistics suggest that many individuals who arrived during or shortly after the COVID-19 pandemic have since returned to their home countries, particularly those who came on study visas.

The most significant decrease occurred in work-related immigration among primary applicants, which fell by 108,000—a 49 percent year-on-year reduction. Study-related immigration dropped by 17 percent, while the number of study dependents saw the steepest decline at 86 percent.

Aliko Dangote, Chairman of the Dangote Group, has stated that the Federal Government earns 52 kobo in taxes from every N1 generated through the production and sale of Dangote Cement.

He made this disclosure during the 2025 Taraba International Investment Summit, held under the theme: “Unlocking Taraba’s Investment Potentials: Advancing Agriculture, Energy, Mining, and Industrialisation for Sustainable Growth and Development.”

Dangote emphasized the importance of creating an enabling environment for businesses, noting that both private and public investments benefit the government through tax revenues.

“It may surprise you to learn that the Federal Government—not even the states—earns more from our cement operations than we do. For every naira we generate, 52 kobo goes to the government,” he said.

Dangote underscored the role of taxation in funding essential services and infrastructure, stating, “We often say government has no business in business—and that may be true. But how else do they generate the revenue needed for education, healthcare, roads, and other public services? Through taxes.”

He cited the example of the United States, saying, “Have you ever heard of the American government owning oil blocks? No. Yet, they are the world’s leading oil producers. Their income comes through taxation.”

Suspected  bandits have killed four people, including two soldiers, in an attack on Ijaha Ikobi, a community in the Apa Local Government Area of Benue State.

A resident of the area who identified himself simply as Adakole told our correspondent that the assailants, believed to be armed herders, invaded the community on Wednesday and laid an ambush.

“The incident happened around 3:30 p.m. on Wednesday when residents began to hear sporadic gunshots within the village,” he said.

“Some soldiers who responded to a distress call ran into the ambush laid by the Fulani herdsmen. Two of them were killed.”

Adakole gave the names of the two civilian victims as Ocheje Sani and Aduba Ogboyi.

He alleged that the attackers also carted away military weapons, including two AK-47 rifles and one submachine gun.

Confirming the incident, the Chairman of Apa Local Government Area, Adam Ogwola, told journalists via telephone on Thursday that the attack occurred in the early hours of Wednesday.

“I received a call about an attack in Ikobi community. Initially, I couldn’t reach anyone there. Later, I got confirmation that two soldiers had been killed,” Ogwola said.

“This morning, the bodies of the two civilians were discovered.”

He noted that the situation in the area was relatively calm, and security had been reinforced with the deployment of more soldiers and police officers.

The chairman also confirmed that the civilian victims had been buried in accordance with local customs.

“Because of our people’s culture, we do not usually keep bodies of those who die in such tragic circumstances in the mortuary. We are in a period of hit-and-run attacks by herders. In such situations, burials typically happen within 24 hours,” he explained.

“The two civilians have been buried, while the bodies of the slain soldiers have been moved out of the community. I’m not sure if they were taken to the mortuary in Ugbokpo or Makurdi.”

Efforts to reach the acting Assistant Director, Army Public Relations, Operation Whirl Stroke, Lawal Osabo, were unsuccessful as he did not respond to calls.

Similarly, calls to the spokesperson for the Benue State Police Command, Catherine Anene, went unanswered, and messages sent to her phone were not returned.

Punch

Aid trucks enter Gaza after delays, as pressure mounts on Israel

Israel allowed 100 aid trucks carrying flour, baby food and medical equipment into the Gaza Strip on Wednesday, the Israeli military said, as UN officials reported that distribution issues had meant that no aid had so far reached people in need.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel would be open to a temporary ceasefire to enable the return of hostages. But otherwise he said it would press ahead with a military campaign to gain total control of Gaza.

After an 11-week blockade on supplies entering Gaza, the Israeli military said a total of 98 aid trucks entered on Monday and Tuesday. But even those minimal supplies have not made it to Gaza's soup kitchens, bakeries, markets and hospitals, according to aid officials and local bakeries that were standing by to receive supplies of flour.

"None of this aid - that is a very limited number of trucks - has reached the Gaza population," said Antoine Renard, country director of the World Food Programme.

The blockade has left Gazans in an increasingly desperate struggle for survival, despite growing international and domestic pressure on Israel's government, which one opposition figure said risked turning the country into a "pariah state".

Thousands of tons of food and other vital supplies are waiting near crossing points into Gaza but until it can be safely distributed, around a quarter of the population remains at risk of famine, Renard said.

"I'm here since eight in the morning, just to get one plate for six people while it is not enough for one person," said Mahmoud al-Haw, who says he often waits for up to six hours a day hoping for some lentil soup to keep his children alive.

U.N. officials said security issues had prevented the aid from moving out of the logistics hub at the Kerem Shalom crossing point but late on Wednesday there appeared some hope that supplies would move more freely.

Nahid Shahaiber, a major transport company owner, said 75 trucks of flour and over a dozen more carrying nutritional supplements and sugar were inside the southern area of Rafah and witnesses said trucks carrying flour had been seen in Deir Al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip.

Israel imposed a blockade on all supplies entering Gaza in March, saying Hamas was seizing supplies meant for civilians - a charge the group denies.

Under mounting international pressure, it has allowed aid deliveries by the U.N. and other aid groups to resume briefly until a new U.S.-backed distribution model using private contractors operating through so-called secure hubs is up and running by the end of the month. But the United Nations says the plan is not impartial or neutral, and it will not be involved.

'PARIAH STATE'

As people waited for supplies to arrive, air strikes and tank fire killed at least 50 people across the Gaza Strip on Wednesday, Palestinian health authorities said. The Israeli military said air strikes hit 115 targets, which it said included rocket launchers, tunnels and unspecified military infrastructure.

Efforts to halt the fighting have faltered, with both Hamas, which insists on a final end to the war and withdrawal of Israeli forces, and Israel, which says Hamas must disarm and leave Gaza, sticking to positions the other side rejects.

Netanyahu said an Israeli air strike this month had probably killed Hamas leader Mohammed Sinwar and he reiterated his demand for the complete demilitarization of Gaza and the exile of Hamas leaders for the war to end.

The resumption of the assault on Gaza since March, following a two-month ceasefire, has drawn condemnation from countries including Britain and Canada that have long been cautious about expressing open criticism of Israel. Even the United States, the country's most important ally, has shown signs of losing patience with Netanyahu.

Netanyahu said it was "a disgrace" that countries like Britain were sanctioning Israel instead of Hamas.

There has been growing unease within Israel meanwhile at the continuation of the war while 58 hostages remain in Gaza.

Left-wing opposition leader Yair Golan drew a furious response from the government and its supporters this week when he declared that "A sane country doesn't kill babies as a hobby" and said Israel risked becoming a "pariah state among the nations."

Golan, a former deputy commander of the Israeli military who went single-handedly to rescue victims of the Hamas attack on Israel on Oct 7, 2023, leads the left-wing Democrats, a small party with little electoral clout.

But his words, and similar comments by former Prime Minister Ehud Olmert in an interview with the BBC, underscored the rift within Israel. Netanyahu dismissed the criticism, saying he was "appalled" by Golan's comments.

Opinion polls show widespread support for a ceasefire that would include the return of all the hostages, with a survey from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem this week showing 70% in favour of a deal.

But hardliners in the cabinet, some of whom argue for the complete expulsion of all Palestinians from Gaza, have insisted on continuing the war until "final victory", which would include disarming Hamas as well as the return of the hostages.

Netanyahu, trailing in the opinion polls and facing trial at home on corruption charges, which he denies, as well as an arrest warrant from the International Criminal Court, has so far sided with the hardliners.

Israel launched its campaign in Gaza in response to the Hamas attack on October 7, 2023, which killed some 1,200 people by Israeli tallies and saw 251 hostages abducted into Gaza.

The campaign has killed more than 53,600 Palestinians, according to Gaza health authorities, and devastated the coastal strip, where aid groups say signs of severe malnutrition are widespread.

Reuters

RUSSIAN PERSPECTIVE

Russia set on creating ‘buffer zone’ in Ukraine – Putin

The Russian military has been tasked with creating a “security buffer zone” along the border with Ukraine, Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Thursday. 

The president made the remarks during a government meeting dedicated to the situation in Russia’s border regions, including Kursk, Belgorod and Bryansk. Additional measures to support their residents were also discussed.

“It has been decided to create the necessary security buffer zone along the border. Our armed forces are actively solving this task now. The enemy’s firing positions are suppressed, the work is going on,” Putin stated.

The idea to create “a certain cordon sanitaire” in Ukrainian-controlled territory along the border was first floated by Putin last March. The president said Moscow could ultimately be “forced” to create such a zone in order to protect civilians in the border regions from Ukrainian long-range strikes. Russian troops would create a “security zone that would be quite difficult for the adversary to overcome with its weapons, primarily of foreign origin,” if and “when we consider it appropriate,” Putin stated at the time.

Putin’s announcement comes in the wake of an indiscriminate Ukrainian strike on the Kursk town of Lgov that left at least 12 civilians wounded, including two children. According to interim Kursk Governor Aleksandr Khinshtein, the attack targeted an area near the Kursk-Rylsk highway where the route enters the town. Media reports indicated the strike involved at least three projectiles fired by a US-supplied HIMARS multiple rocket launcher.

Over the past two days, Kiev conducted a massive long-range drone attack even deeper into Russia. According to the Russian Defense Ministry, a total of 485 Ukrainian fixed-wing UAVs were downed across the country in the past 48 hours. At least 63 of the drones were intercepted in Moscow Region, while the largest number were stopped over Orel Region, the military said.

WESTERN PERSPECTIVE

Russia says it downs at least 159 Ukrainian drones, fires Iskander missile

Russia said on Thursday it had shot down 159 Ukrainian drones over Russian regions, including about 20 headed towards Moscow, as the war in Ukraine heated up despite major powers discussing ways to end Europe's deadliest conflict since World War Two.

U.S. President Donald Trump is pressuring Russia and Ukraine to end the more than three-year war, but the two sides remain far apart. Ukraine and its Western allies are demanding an immediate and unconditional ceasefire but Russia says certain conditions must first be met. Kyiv says those conditions are unacceptable.

While leaders talk of the prospects for peace, the war is intensifying: swarms of drones are being launched by both sides while fierce fighting is underway along key parts of the front.

Russia's defence ministry said 159 drones had been shot down over Russian regions between 8 a.m. and 8 p.m. (0500-1700 GMT) on Thursday. The previous day, Russia said it shot down well over 300 Ukrainian drones.

Moscow mayor Sergei Sobyanin reported late in the evening that 17 drones had been downed over the region surrounding Moscow, which has a population of 21 million. Sobyanin had earlier reported 40 downed drones overnight.

Three Moscow airports - Domodedovo, Vnukovo and Zhukovsky - suspended flights intermittently.

Separately, Russia said on Thursday it had fired an Iskander-M missile at part of the city of Pokrov, formerly known as Ordzhonikidze, in Ukraine's Dnipropetrovsk region, destroying two Patriot missile launchers and an AN/MPQ-65 radar set.

Ukraine's air force reported damage in the Dnipropetrovsk region after an attack but did not specify the type of weapon.

The governor of Russia's western Kursk region said a Ukrainian missile strike on the town of Lgov had wounded 16 people.

The Russia-installed governor of the occupied part of Ukraine's Zaporizhzhia region said a Ukrainian strike had killed a woman and injured four children in a car.

RUSSIA REPORTS ADVANCES

Russia's defence ministry said its forces were advancing at key points along the front, and pro-Russian war bloggers said Russia had pierced Ukrainian lines between Pokrovsk and Kostiantynivka in the Donetsk region of eastern Ukraine.

The Russian defence ministry said its forces had captured the settlement of Nova Poltavka in between those two towns.

Ukraine's military made no such acknowledgement in a late evening report on the area but the popular DeepState war blog, which refers to open source reports, showed the settlement to be under Russian occupation.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy had said on Wednesday that the heaviest frontline battles were around Pokrovsk, but made no reference to any Russian advances.

Russia currently controls a little under one fifth of Ukraine and says the territory is now formally part of Russia, a position Ukraine and its European allies do not accept.

Moscow annexed Crimea in 2014. Russian forces also control almost all of Luhansk and more than 70% of the Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson regions, according to Russian estimates. Russia also controls a sliver of the Kharkiv region.

RT/Reuters