Russia strikes Ukraine and signals resistance to amended peace plan
- The San Juan Daily Star
- 7 hours ago
- 5 min read
By MARIA VARENIKOVA and AURELIEN BREEDEN
Russia launched a deadly barrage of missiles and drones on the Ukrainian capital Tuesday, as Kremlin officials signaled they would resist changes negotiated by Ukraine to President Donald Trump’s peace plan.
The attack on Kyiv, the capital, killed at least seven people and injured 20 others, according to the city’s mayor. It came as the Trump administration was working to maintain diplomatic momentum behind its efforts to end the nearly 4-year-old war, which were jump-started last week when it presented a 28-point peace plan to Ukraine.
American and Russian officials held talks Tuesday in Abu Dhabi, the capital of the United Arab Emirates, about the proposed deal, which heavily favored Russia in its initial form and was amended and streamlined in talks between Ukraine and the Trump administration over the weekend. Ukraine has indicated that its president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, was prepared to go to Washington to finalize a deal with Trump.
Trump said in a social media post Tuesday that “there are only a few remaining points of disagreement” on the proposal, and that he was sending Steve Witkoff, a special envoy, to meet with Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin, in Moscow. Trump also said he was sending Daniel P. Driscoll, the U.S. Army secretary, to meet with Ukrainian officials.
Sergey V. Lavrov, Russia’s foreign minister, said that Russia was waiting for the United States to submit an “interim” version of the modified plan.
“Then we will see,” Lavrov said after a meeting in Moscow with his Belarusian counterpart.
If the plan “erased” what Lavrov called “the spirit and letter of Anchorage” — referring to an August meeting in Alaska where Trump sided with Russia’s approach to end the conflict — then “it will be a fundamentally different situation,” he said, suggesting that Russia would resist rolling back the maximalist positions that were in the plan.
Some of Ukraine’s Western allies, who make up a so-called coalition of the willing and were not involved in the Trump administration’s initial plan, met Tuesday by video conference to discuss the peace efforts and future security guarantees for Ukraine. Those guarantees are among the major points still under negotiation, along with issues involving Ukraine’s territory, military capacity and aspirations for membership in NATO.
Zelenskyy said that Moscow’s attack on Kyiv ran counter to the efforts to end the war.
“Last night, Russia launched another attack — at a time when Ukraine, together with America, Europe, and many others around the world, are working virtually around the clock to stop the bloodshed,” Zelenskyy said on social media.
Ukraine also carried out strikes on Russia overnight, hitting the southern Krasnodar region in what Veniamin Kondratyev, the local governor, said was one of the longest and biggest attacks. Three people were killed in separate strikes on the neighboring Rostov region, the governor there said on social media.
Since Wednesday, when a Russian missile strike killed at least 39 people in the western city of Ternopil, there had been a relative lull in attacks on Ukraine beyond the front lines. But many Ukrainians expected another large-scale assault despite the recent flurry of diplomatic activity.
“It doesn’t look like they are agreeing on anything,” Dariy Svitlyi, 22, a driver, said as he drank coffee outside a cafe in Kyiv. “I feel very sorry for all the guys who died on the battlefield, and just as sorry for all those who are now fighting and risking their lives.”
Anatoliy Dnistrovyi, a writer, said he saw a familiar pattern repeating itself: American pressure to accept a peace proposal followed by a Russian missile attack. “With the Russians, everything has long since happened to us already and keeps repeating over and over,” he said.
American officials expressed optimism that progress was being made after Driscoll, who was at the Geneva talks, met Tuesday with a Russian delegation in the United Arab Emirates. “The talks are going well and we remain optimistic,” said his spokesperson, Lt. Col. Jeff Tolbert.
Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, said Ukraine and Russia were moving closer to a deal. “There are a few delicate, but not insurmountable, details that must be sorted out and will require further talks between Ukraine, Russia, and the United States,” she said on social media.
While Ukrainian officials struck a similarly positive tone Tuesday, they cautioned that talks were ongoing and a final deal had not been agreed.
Rustem Umerov, Zelenskyy’s national security adviser, said on social media that the American and Ukrainian delegations had “reached a common understanding on the core terms of the agreement discussed in Geneva” and that Zelenskyy was prepared to travel to the United States to finalize a deal with Trump.
Oleksandr Bevz, a member of the Ukrainian negotiating team, said that talks in Geneva had been “unexpectedly constructive for both sides” and that American officials had been “very receptive to our arguments.”
Vitalii Portnikov, a Ukrainian political analyst, said the initial U.S. plan had emerged through a “misunderstanding” of Russian goals by the Trump administration. Russia prioritizes political and territorial objectives over economic ones, he said, arguing that attempts to end the war with financial incentives and trade would not work.
“Trump reasons rationally,” Portnikov said. “But how logical is that when you are dealing with irrational partners in the Kremlin?”
Zelenskyy said the overnight attack on Kyiv had caused extensive damage to residential buildings across the city.
Russian strikes also hit the regions of Odesa, Dnipro, Kharkiv, Chernihiv and Cherkasy. “The primary targets were the energy sector and everything that keeps normal life going,” Zelenskyy said.
Ukraine’s European allies, who were not involved in drafting the initial proposal, have insisted that they should have a say. “Decisions with implications for Europe and NATO interests need the joint support of European partners and NATO allies,” President Emmanuel Macron of France said.
Macron hailed the latest talks and said there was “finally a chance to make real progress toward a good peace.”
“But the absolute condition for a good peace is a set of very robust security guarantees, and not paper guarantees,” he added. “Ukraine has had its share of promises that were shattered by successive Russian aggressions.”
Some Ukrainians balked at attempts by the Trump administration to pressure Ukraine into accepting a deal.
“Even for a bad peace, you shouldn’t issue an ultimatum to the victim — you need to put pressure on the aggressor,” said Yaroslav Yurchyshyn, a member of parliament from the opposition Holos party.
Still, he added: “It’s hard not to have expectations about ending the war — we all want this very much.”