The buggy-like vehicles would spare troops from operating in areas near the front where Russian shelling.

Ukraine has bought thousands of uncrewed robotic ground vehicles next year to shuttle ammunition and supplies to infantry in the trenches and evacuate wounded soldiers.

The buggy-like vehicles, an example of how technology is transforming trench warfare in Ukraine, would spare troops from operating in areas near the front where Russian shelling and drones are rife, Mykhailo Fedorov, the deputy prime minister for innovation, said.

Mr Fedorov, who has overseen drone procurement for most of the war, told Reuters: “This year we purchased several thousand ground platforms, and next year, I believe, we need tens of thousands.”

The vehicles, he said, are already being used along the front and in Russia’s Kursk region, where Kyiv’s troops carved out an enclave in an August incursion. Ukraine has several training centres to teach their use, he added.

Ukraine is slowly losing territory to Russia in the east. Volodymyr Zelensky, Ukraine’s president, said on Sunday that his army no longer had the firepower or manpower to take back occupied parts of his country, and is now pushing for a “diplomatic” solution.

The use of military technology has rapidly evolved, even as the war has been locked in a bloody, attritional struggle with no major battlefield changes despite Russia’s recently accelerating gains 33 months since the 2022 invasion.

Mr Fedorov, whose official remit is digital affairs, has played a prominent role in supporting the development of military technology through a government-backed platform to nurture private-sector innovation. As of this month he no longer oversees the procurement of drones.

Ukraine has focused heavily on increasing production and improving the specifications of long-range attack drones to conduct deep strikes on Russia, narrowing the gulf in capabilities with its adversary.

Ukrainian production of long-range drones has increased dozens of times since 2023, with Mr Zelensky targeting output of 30,000 of the deep-strike weapons next year, Mr Fedorov said.

Russia has been launching thousands of long-range drones per month, making heavy use of low-cost “decoy” drones that wear down Ukraine’s air defence forces, as they see a blip on the radar and are forced to shoot it down.

Mr Fedorov said Ukraine was also using decoy drones and was sometimes launching more attack drones on a given night than Russia, but it was not purely a numbers game.

“[AI is] used to some extent, but the more critical issues are connectivity and launch methods of deep strike (drones),” he said.

“Russia has improved monitoring of (Ukraine’s) drone launches, quickly responding and targeting launch sites. These nuances require constant launch method and connectivity changes.”

Ukraine had attack drones that could fly up to 1,800 km (1,120 miles), he said, also confirming that Ukraine was working on drones to intercept the Shahed-type long-range attack drones that Russia uses for its nightly attacks on Ukrainian cities.

“There is some testing by certain companies producing ... aircraft that, thanks to specialised software and radars, can strike Shaheds, but this is still in the research and development phase. There are certain results,” he said.

He added that Ukraine had contracted to buy 1.6 million drones this year, of which 1.3 million had been supplied, including low-cost “first-person view” drones that have cameras allowing remote pilots to fly them towards their targets.

Ukraine has also been using dozens of domestically made artificial intelligence-augmented systems for its drones to reach targets on the battlefield without being piloted, allowing it to remain effective in areas protected by extensive jamming.

Mr Fedorov said 10 companies were consistently competing in state procurements to offer AI products.

“I think next year will significantly increase the percentage of autonomous drones with targeting,” he said. “We might see the first real drone swarm uses, though not on a massive scale. The first steps will happen.”

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Zelenskyy says NATO offer for Ukraine-controlled territory could end 'hot stage' of war

An offer of NATO membership to territory under Kyiv’s control would end “the hot stage of the war” in Ukraine, but any proposal to join the military alliance should be extended to all parts of the country that fall under internationally recognized borders, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in a broadcast interview.

Zelenskyy’s remarks on Friday signaled a possible way forward to the difficult path Ukraine faces to future NATO membership. At their summit in Washington in July, the 32 members declared Ukraine on an “irreversible” path to membership.

However, one obstacle to moving forward has been the view that Ukraine’s borders would need to be clearly demarcated before it could join so that there can be no mistaking where the alliance’s pact of mutual defense would come into effect.

“You can’t give an invitation to just one part of a country," Zelenskyy said in an excerpt of the interview with Sky News. "Why? Because thus you would recognize that Ukraine is only that territory of Ukraine and the other one is Russia.”

Under the Ukrainian Constitution, Ukraine can't recognize territory occupied by Russia as Russian.

“So legally, by law, we have no right to recognize the occupied territory as territory of Russia,” he said.

Since the start of the war in 2022, Russia has been expending huge amounts of weaponry and human life to make small-but-steady territorial gains to the nearly one-fifth of Ukraine it already controls in east and southern Ukraine.

“If we want to stop the hot stage of the war, we should take under the NATO umbrella the territory of Ukraine that we have under our control. That’s what we need to do, fast. And then Ukraine can get back the other part of its territory diplomatically,” he said.

An invitation for Ukraine to join NATO is one key point of Zelenskyy’s “victory plan,” which he presented to Western allies and the Ukrainian people in October. The plan is seen as a way for Ukraine to strengthen its hand in any negotiations with Moscow.

Earlier this week, NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte said that the alliance “needs to go further” to support Ukraine in its fight against Russia's invasion. Military aid to Kyiv and steps toward ending the war are expected to be high on the agenda when NATO members' foreign ministers meet in Brussels for a two-day gathering starting on Dec. 3.

However, any decision for Ukraine to join the military alliance would require a lengthier process and the agreement of all member states.

There is also uncertainty as to the foreign policy stance of U.S. President-elect Donald Trump. While Trump vowed on the campaign trail to end Russia's invasion of Ukraine in a single day, he hasn't publicly discussed how this could happen. Trump also announced Wednesday that Keith Kellogg, an 80-year-old, highly decorated retired three-star general, would serve as his special envoy for Ukraine and Russia.

In April, Kellog wrote that “bringing the Russia-Ukraine war to a close will require strong, America First leadership to deliver a peace deal and immediately end the hostilities between the two warring parties.”

Meanwhile, during his only campaign debate with U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris, Trump twice refused to directly answer a question about whether he wanted Ukraine to win the war — raising concerns that Kyiv could be forced to accept unfavorable terms in any negotiations.

Zelenskyy’s statement comes as Ukraine faces increasing pressure along the 1,000-kilometer (620-mile) front line. In its latest report, Washington-based think tank the Institute for the Study of War said Saturday that Russian forces had recently advanced near Kupiansk, in Toretsk, and near Pokrovsk and Velyka Novosilka, a key logistics route for the Ukrainian military.

At least four people were killed Saturday when a Russian missile hit Ukraine's Dnipropetrovsk region, Zelenskyy said in a post on Telegram. Dnipropetrovsk Gov. Serhiy Lysak said that the strike also wounded at least 21 people, of which eight were in a serious condition.

Ukraine’s air force announced Saturday that the country had come under attack from 10 Russian drones, of which eight were shot down over the Kyiv, Cherkasy, Kirovohrad, Dnipropetrovsk and Kherson regions. One drone returned to Russian-occupied territory, while the final drone disappeared from radar, often a sign of the use of electronic defenses.

Meanwhile, the Russian Defense Ministry said that 11 Ukrainian drones had been shot down by the country’s air defense systems. Both the mayor of Sochi, Andrey Proshunin, and the head of Russia’s Dagestan region, Sergey Melikov, both in Russia’s southwest, said that drones had been destroyed in their regions overnight. No casualties were reported.

On Friday, the Ukrainian president announced a number of changes to military leadership, saying that changes in personnel management were needed to improve the situation on the battlefield.

Gen. Mykhailo Drapatyi, who led the defense of Kharkiv during Russia’s new offensive on Ukraine’s second-largest city this year, was appointed the new head of Ukraine’s Ground Forces. Oleh Apostol was named as the new deputy commander-in-chief responsible for improving military training.

Ukraine's top military commander, Gen. Oleksandr Syrskyi, also announced Friday that he would bolster units in Donetsk, Pokrovsk and Kurakhove with additional reserves, ammunition, weapons and military equipment. 

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