Ukraine's military has denied Russian claims of a Ukrainian drone strike on a bus carrying children in Russia's Bryansk region.

Other Nato members have increased their contributions to the alliance's crisis forces to fill many of the gaps left by US cuts to its commitments, chief Mark Rutte said on Wednesday.

“There are ... areas that require more work but the overall picture is looking good,” Rutte told reporters at Nato headquarters in Brussels ahead of a meeting of alliance defence ministers on Thursday. He did not provide further details.

Germany and Poland were set to sign a new defense agreement Wednesday, putting aside their complicated past to strengthen European military cooperation at a time of heightened tension with Russia and growing uncertainty over U.S. engagement in Europe.

Relations between the two neighbors in recent years have become more pragmatic in the wake of Russia’s full‑scale war on Ukraine in 2022 and the coming to power of a liberal government in Poland in 2023.

As the U.S. weighs a partial drawdown of its military presence in Europe, Poland is keen to ensure that major European allies take a greater role in defending the continent’s eastern flank.

Ukraine's military has struck the FINA A tanker in the Black Sea, which it described as part of Russian “shadow fleet”, the Ukrainian General Staff said in a post on Telegram on Wednesday.

The General Staff said that the target was successfully struck and the extent of the damage was still undergoing an assessment.

It added that Ukrainian forces also struck a road bridge across the North Crimean Canal near the settlement of Stavky and a road bridge near Voinka in the occupied part of the Kherson region.

Ukraine has won key pledges of further support for its fight against Russia from world leaders attending the Group of Seven summit in France, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said Wednesday.

The leaders of the world’s leading industrial economies promised to strengthen Ukraine’s air defences and ensure its energy supply, as well as step up international economic pressure on Moscow, as Kyiv’s fight against Russia’s all-out invasion stretches into its fifth year with no end in sight.

he close encounter off the Isle of Wight between the Russian frigate Admiral Grigorovich and Alan and Jane Kelvey’s yacht Bright Hope seems to have been more accident than sinister plot. The yacht had been getting too close to the warship. Klaxons were sounded and then came a brief volley of small arms fired into the path of Bright Hope. The adventurous Kelveys then put on the engine and turned sharply away.

This was not an act of war, these “yacht potshots – and, apparently had little connection with the dramatic and stagey seizure of the tanker Smyrtos, part of the Russian shadow fleet, by Royal Marines at the weekend. But this appears to be a story of the sea mists of war, if not actual fog.

In a significant aspect, the two incidents are linked – and in a way that suggests that the conflict in Ukraine is now at a decisive phase, or a “culminating point” in military jargon.

The Admiral Grigorovich, a Russian frigate, fired warning shots after making attempts to contact the yacht, the MoD claimed, in order to prevent a potential collision. Russia’s defence ministry has claimed its sailors were acting “in strict accordance” with international shipping regulations.

While this is being viewed as an isolated incident, it came days after tensions between the UK and Russia spiked when Britain seized a sanctioned vessel transiting through the Channel.

The operation, which saw commandos fast-roping from a helicopter onto the tanker, was the first of its kind carried out by UK armed forces.

Bryony Gooch reports: