Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy says a Ukrainian delegation is set to meet on Thursday with U.S. President Donald Trump's envoys ahead of another round of trilateral talks with Russia. Zelenskyy told reporters on Wednesday that Ukraine's negotiator Rustem Umerov will hold talks with Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner in Geneva. A round of nuclear talks between the United States and Iran is expected to be held on the same day in the Swiss city.
Russia has attacked Ukrainian cities again overnight as Ukraine accuses Russia of dragging its feet on new U.S.-brokered peace talks. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy says Washington is proposing talks next week in Miami or in Abu Dhabi, in the United Arab Emirates. He says Ukraine confirms it can attend but Russia is hesitating. Zelenskyy says major disputes still block a deal, including issues of occupied land and security guarantees. He also says Russia is ignoring a proposed ceasefire that impacts the energy sector. Ukraine's air force said on Thursday that Russia fired drones and missiles at Kyiv, Kharkiv, Dnipro and Odesa. Officials report injuries, damaged homes and major heating outages in the Ukrainian capital.
A new report warns that the number of soldiers killed, injured or missing in Russia's war in Ukraine could reach 2 million by spring. The report by the Center for Strategic and International Studies estimates that Russia has suffered the largest troop deaths for any major power since World War II. It estimates Russia suffered 1.2 million casualties, including up to 325,000 deaths, since February 2022. It said Ukraine has suffered between 500,000 to 600,000 casualties, including up to 140,000 deaths. Officials said Wednesday that two people were killed near Kyiv after Russian strikes and at least nine were injured in attacks across Ukraine.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy says that Russia has launched more than 300 drones and missiles in a nighttime attack on Ukraine's power grid. The assault knocked out heating to more than 5,600 apartment buildings in Kyiv. Mayor Vitali Klitschko reported on Tuesday that nearly 80% of these buildings had just regained heat after a previous attack. Ukraine is facing one of its coldest winters with temperatures in Kyiv dropping to minus 20 degrees Celsius or minus 4 Fahrenheit. Ukrainian officials meanwhile are in the U.S. for peace talks. They aim to finalize documents for a proposed peace settlement that focuses on postwar security and economic recovery.
Officials say emergency repair crews are working tirelessly to restore power in the Kyiv region of Ukraine. Russian attacks on energy infrastructure have left Ukrainians facing the coldest winter in years. In Boryspil, workers are dismantling and rebuilding burned-out electrical systems. They work in the snow from early morning till midnight. The supply has been restored for four hours a day, but the system collapses when power returns as people rush to use appliances. Kyiv residents are enduring freezing temperatures and darkness, with some homes without electricity for days. Russian barrages are aiming at power plants and large substations, and procuring replacement equipment such as transformers can take months.
Russia has launched another major drone and missile attack on Ukraine that targeted the country's power grid in freezing temperatures. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Tuesday that Russia fired nearly 300 drones, 18 ballistic missiles and seven cruise missiles at eight regions overnight. A strike in the Kharkiv region killed four people. The attack left several hundred thousand households without power in the Kyiv region. Russia launched a similar attack four days earlier in which Moscow used a powerful hypersonic missile. The U.S. has accused Russia of escalating the conflict. Ukraine is seeking quicker air defense deliveries from the U.S. and Europe to counter the attacks.
Russia has launched a massive overnight attack on Ukraine, using hundreds of drones and dozens of missiles. Officials say at least four people have been killed. For only the second time in the nearly 4-year-old war, it used a powerful, new hypersonic missile that struck western Ukraine in a clear warning to Kyiv's NATO allies. The attack came days after Ukraine and its allies reported major progress toward agreeing on how to defend the country from further aggression by Moscow if a U.S.-led peace deal is struck. The attack also coincides with a new chill in relations between Moscow and Washington over Venezuela and the U.S. seizure of one of its oil tankers in the North Atlantic.
Ukrainian officials say that Russia pounded the capital with yet another major missile and drone attack. At least least two people were killed in the attack overnight into Thursday. The strikes caused fires across Kyiv a day after the heaviest aerial attack of the war so far. An official in Kyiv said at least 22 people were wounded in the latest barrage. Russia has recently sought to overwhelm Ukraine's air defenses with major attacks that include increasing numbers of decoy drones. The pressure has caused alarm among Ukrainian officials who are uncertain about continuing vital military aid from the United States and U.S. President Donald Trump's policy toward Russia.
Russia has fired dozens of missiles and drones across Ukraine for a second day. Ukraine's president says some were shot down by Western-supplied F-16 fighter jets before they reached their targets. It's the apparent first use by Ukraine of the F-16s to shoot down a missile. The Russian onslaught killed five people and destroyed some critical infrastructure in multiple regions. That has prolonged power outages in sweltering heat. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has renewed calls for the U.S. to lift restrictions and let Ukraine strike deep inside Russia. Ukraine's military chief says troops now control nearly 500 square miles of Russia's Kursk region.
Signing an agreement with Russia to stop the war with Ukraine would amount to signing a deal with the devil. That's the position of a top adviser to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Mykhailo Podolyak spoke to The Associated Press in an interview Thursday as pressure mounts on the country to seek an end to more than two years of fighting. He said a deal would only buy time for Russian President Vladimir Putin to strengthen his army and usher in another, potentially more violent chapter in the war. It is a view held across Zelenskyy's camp and reflected broadly among Ukrainians.
