Two killed and several injured in Russian drone attacks in Ukraine
Officials in the Russian-occupied part of Kherson also said two people had died in Ukrainian shelling on Sunday.
A Russian drone attack on the Ukrainian city of Kherson has killed one person and injured six, according to local officials.
Also in Ukraine’s southern Kherson region on Sunday – an area mostly occupied by Russia early in the war but later partially retaken by Ukrainian forces – a man was killed in another drone attack 35 miles away in a village on the right bank of the Dnieper River, regional head Oleksandr Prokudin said.
On the other side of the river, Moscow-appointed officials in the Russian-occupied part of Kherson said two people had died in Ukrainian shelling on Sunday.
Moscow sent 79 drones into Ukraine overnight into Sunday, Ukrainian officials said. According to Ukraine’s Air Force, 63 drones were destroyed and 16 were “lost”, likely having been electronically jammed.
Russia’s defence ministry said on Sunday morning that 62 Ukrainian drones had been shot down over Russia over the previous 24 hours.
The developments come as Britain hosts a summit of European leaders to shore up support for Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky after an astonishing Oval Office blowout with President Donald Trump that left many uncertain where the once-staunch allies stand.
Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer announced on Sunday that Britain, France and Ukraine have agreed to work on a ceasefire plan to present to the United States.
Russian foreign minister Sergey Lavrov has already said that sending European peacekeepers to Ukraine, as could be the case under a deal, would amount to a continuation of Europe’s “incitement” of Ukraine to wage war against Russia.
In comments published on the foreign ministry’s website, Mr Lavrov said European leaders “want to prop up (Zelensky) with their ‘bayonets’ in the form of peacekeeping units”.
Mr Lavrov also commented on the warming US-Russia relations, describing negotiations between senior diplomats of both countries and other officials in Saudi Arabia in February as “a completely normal conversation between two delegations”.
He added: “We will never think alike on every issue of world politics. We acknowledged this in Riyadh.
“Two serious countries simply sat down to talk about where they are going wrong, and what their predecessor messed up in four years,” he added, accusing the Biden administration of “destroying all channels of contact without exception”.
As the summit got under way in London on Sunday, US House Speaker Mike Johnson raised the prospect that Mr Zelensky may need to leave office if a peace deal is to be reached.
“Something has to change,” the Republican said on NBC. “Either he needs to come to his senses and come back to the table in gratitude or someone else needs to lead the country to do that.”
He said “it’s up to the Ukrainians to figure that out”, adding that under Mr Trump, the United States is “reasserting peace through strength”.
The idea of Mr Zelensky stepping aside had come up on Friday after the Oval Office meeting.
US Republican senator Lindsey Graham told reporters outside the White House the Ukrainian leader “either needs to resign or send somebody over that we can do business with, or he needs to change”.
Meanwhile, White House national security adviser Mike Waltz says ending the war will require “Russian concessions on security guarantees” as well as territorial concessions by Ukraine.
Mr Waltz said “this will be clearly some type of territorial concession for security guarantees going forward,” but he was not providing any more details about what the Russians would have to do.
During an interview with CNN’s State Of The Union, Mr Waltz said: “This needs to be European-led security guarantees going forward. Part of that is Europe’s contribution to its own defence so it has the capability to do so.”
As for the United States, he said: “What type of support we provide or not is to be negotiated.”
Mr Waltz says the US is looking for a Ukrainian leader who can deal with Washington, “eventually deal with the Russians” and end the war.
“And if it becomes apparent that President Zelensky’s either personal motivations or political motivations are divergent from ending the fighting in his country, then I think we have a real issue on our hands.”
