President says three days of strikes will not ‘go unpunished’ and points to Ukrainian attack on Russian oil refinery. What we know on day 1,543

Volodymyr Zelenskyy promised retribution against Russia on Friday after laying red roses at the rubble of a Kyiv apartment building where a Russian missile strike killed 24 people, including three children. “Ukraine will not allow any of the aggressor’s strikes that take the lives of our people to go unpunished,” the president said after meeting top military and intelligence officials to discuss retaliatory long-range strikes. Zelenskyy said later in his nightly video address that retaliatory actions had already been approved, and pointed to an overnight attack on an oil refinery that the military said triggered a large fire in the central Russian city of Ryazan.

The strike on Ryazan’s huge oil refinery was part of a large-scale Ukrainian long-range drone attack targeting several regions in Russia after Moscow’s forces pounded Ukraine with three days of massive strikes with missiles and drones, reports Peter Beaumont. The scale of the attacks appeared to put paid to claims of Donald Trump that a peace deal between Russia and Ukraine was close, after recent remarks by the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, that the war might be approaching an end.

Trump told reporters that the strikes on Kyiv – launched hours after a three-day US-brokered ceasefire expired – could disrupt efforts to find a diplomatic resolution to the war.

A Russian court has ordered Belgian financial group Euroclear to pay about $250bn in damages over the freezing of billions of dollars’ worth of Russian assets in the EU since the Ukraine war. It was not clear how Russia intended to recover the funds, and Euroclear said it did not recognise the Russian court’s jurisdiction. The Moscow court said it upheld the Russian central bank’s claim, while Euroclear told Agence France-Presse the bank’s claims were “without merit”.

Ukraine has stepped up drone attacks on Russia’s energy infrastructure, doubling the number of oil refineries targeted since the start of the year, according to information posted on social media by Russian officials. The strikes have reduced Russia’s oil output – the world’s third-largest after the US and Saudi Arabia – adding pressure to Moscow’s federal budget.

Ukraine’s mental health crisis is palpable and growing amid the war, the World Health Organization said, warning the effects could be felt for generations. WHO’s latest data showed 71% of people “have episodes of anxiety, stress, sleepless nights”, said its representative in Ukraine, Jarno Habicht.

Greek investigators believe a military sea drone found on a Greek island last week went off course due to a technical failure and may not have travelled far, Reuters quoted sources as saying on Friday. The explosives-laden drone – which Greece says is Ukrainian, a claim Kyiv has denied – was discovered on the shores of Lefkada on 7 May, triggering diplomatic tensions between Athens and Kyiv.

A Russian attack struck a grain terminal at a Ukrainian port, injuring seven people and causing other damage, Ukraine’s development ministry said on X on Friday, without specifying the port.

German prosecutors said a German judge had enforced an arrest warrant against a Ukrainian national suspected of spying for Russia. The defendant, identified only as Sergey N, had been detained in Spain at the end of March and extradited to Germany on Thursday, the prosecutors added.

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Raymond Biesinger is a Montréal-based illustrator, artist, and best-selling author. He says, "My work is very much a collage that doesn't look like a collage—pieces made from real-world lines, shapes, and textures scanned into a computer that's used as an infinitely-forgiving Xerox machine, glue, and scissors. These components lose their recognizability in the process, but when repetitively used bring flaws, eccentricities, and geometries that form a visual vocabulary."

Probably due to the graphic design nature of his work, Biesinger's art is very strongly linked with the written word. Here are some interesting places that he's associated with. Drawn & Quarterly, located in Montreal: Over the past thirty years, Drawn & Quarterly has grown from a single-issue magazine to an internationally renowned publisher of the world's best cartoonists. This is one of the places where you can buy Biesinger's book. Librairie Pulp Books & Café: an English-language bookstore and coffee bar located in Verdun, QC, specializing in new books across several genres. Raymond made some imaginary bookmarks for them. He's done some illustrations for The Walrus. The Walrus provokes new thinking and sparks conversation on matters vital to Canadians. He did a cover for the Literary Review of Canada which has provided a space for the country's best and emerging writers to reflect deeply on politics, philosophy, science, history, culture, and literature since 1991. This post is really about Biesinger so I'll end this with a few more links to his art. Colossal: Multi-Part Graphics Reveal the Inner Workings of Systems in Vintage-Inspired Designs by Raymond Biesinger An interview Une autre entrevue, cette fois en français. Some more art Lost buildings of NYC A reddit thread with many more lost buildings from cities all over the U.S.