Ukraine destroys more than 40 Russian military aircraft in drone attack: official
A Ukrainian drone attack has destroyed more than 40 Russian planes deep in Russia's territory, a Ukrainian security official told The Associated Press on Sunday, while Russia pounded Ukraine with missiles and drones a day before the two sides meet for a new round of direct talks in Istanbul.
The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to disclose operational details, said the attack took more than a year-and-a-half to execute and was personally supervised by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.
The operation saw drones transported in containers carried by trucks deep into Russian territory, he said. The drones reportedly hit 41 bombers stationed at several airfields on Sunday afternoon, including the Belaya air base in Russia's Irkutsk region, more than 4000km from Ukraine.
It is the first time that a Ukrainian drone has been seen in the region, local governor Igor Kobzev said. He also said in a statement that the drone had been launched from a truck. Russian officials in the Ryazan and Murmansk regions also reported drone activity on Sunday afternoon, but did not give further details.
The attack came the same day as Zelenskyy said Ukraine will send a delegation to Istanbul for a new round of direct peace talks with Russia on Monday.
In a statement on Telegram, Zelensky said that Defense Minister Rustem Umerov will lead the Ukrainian delegation. 'We are doing everything to protect our independence, our state and our people,' Zelensky said.
Ukrainian officials had previously called on the Kremlin to provide a promised memorandum setting out its position on ending the war before the meeting takes place. Moscow had said it would share its memorandum during the talks.
Russian strike hits an army unit
Russia on Sunday launched the biggest number of drones — 472 — on Ukraine since the full-scale invasion in February 2022, Ukraine's air force said.
Russian forces also launched seven missiles alongside the barrage of drones, said Yuriy Ignat, head of communications for the air force. Earlier Sunday, Ukraine's army said at least 12 Ukrainian service members were killed and more than 60 were injured in a Russian missile strike on an army training unit.
The strike occurred at 12.50pm, the statement said, emphasising that no formations or mass gatherings of personnel were being held at the time. An investigative commission was created to uncover the circumstances around the attack that led to such a loss in personnel, the statement said.
The training unit is located to the rear of the 1000km active front line, where Russian reconnaissance and strike drones are able to strike.
Ukraine's forces suffer from manpower shortages and take extra precautions to avoid mass gatherings as the skies across the front line are saturated with Russian drones looking for targets.
'If it is established that the actions or inaction of officials led to the death or injury of servicemen, those responsible will be held strictly accountable,' the Ukrainian Ground Forces' statement said.
Northern pressure
Russia's Ministry of Defense said Sunday that it had taken control of the village of Oleksiivka in Ukraine's northern Sumy region. Ukrainian authorities in Sumy ordered mandatory evacuations in 11 more settlements Saturday as Russian forces make steady gains in the area.
Speaking Saturday, Ukraine's top army chief, Oleksandr Syrskyi, said that Russian forces were focusing their main offensive efforts on Pokrovsk, Toretsk and Lyman in the Donetsk region, as well as the Sumy border area.
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The Age
4 hours ago
- The Age
Anger over drone attack shows Ukraine hit Russia where it hurt
Kyiv: For 18 months, Ukraine's internal security service planned an audacious assault on far-flung Russian airfields – first sneaking drones into Russia, then planting them near key military runways. On Sunday, just ahead of a new round of peace talks, it was go time. Near four unsuspecting Russian military bases, remotely activated roofs lifted off mobile homes and sheds parked on flatbed trucks. Armed Ukrainian drones tucked inside soared upwards, then pounced on military aircraft lined up on the runways, engulfing many in flames. The brazen attack – which Ukrainian officials claimed destroyed at least 13 Russian aircraft and damaged dozens of others – shocked Russia and instantly reduced its capabilities to threaten a nuclear attack or launch missile strikes on Ukraine and other countries. It also served as a crucial reminder to Moscow and Ukraine's Western partners that Kyiv remains capable of exploiting Russia's weaknesses and disrupting its war plans, despite being outnumbered and outgunned. Ukraine said the damaged or destroyed aircraft, some of which were nuclear-capable, included A-50, Tu-95, Tu-22 M3 and Tu-160 models – planes Kyiv said Russia had used nearly every night to bomb Ukraine. Many details of how the attack was planned are not public, and it was not immediately clear how many of the Russian planes were operational at the time they were targeted. But the swift, angry reactions in Russia confirmed that Ukraine had exploited, to devastating effect, an obvious vulnerability: essential and expensive aircraft left out in the open but believed safe because they were deep inside the country. The operation also marked the latest example of drone technology redefining modern warfare. Russia and Ukraine met for a brief second round of direct talks in Istanbul on Monday, agreeing to swap dead and captured soldiers, but otherwise, there was no significant progress towards ending the gruelling war or even agreeing to a ceasefire. Western analysts said Ukraine's strikes on Sunday will hinder Russia's ability to launch cruise missiles into Ukraine and could force Russian commanders to shift significant resources to better protect aviation assets. But the analysts cautioned that the strikes are unlikely to significantly alter the course of the war, as Moscow still has enough aircraft to continue bombing Ukrainian cities and infrastructure. Video footage and reactions published on social media showed that in Russia, the drone strikes stirred panic, confusion and then, from pro-war commentators, rage. Governors from several regions, including as far as Siberia, reported drone attacks. Russian onlookers filmed smoke billowing over the airfields and narrated their shock. Soon, pro-war military bloggers had dubbed the attack 'Russia's Pearl Harbour'. In videos that could not be independently verified by The Washington Post, people who appear to be locals living around the air bases recorded drones zooming past them and plumes of black smoke on the horizon. In one video, a woman watches a drone move toward a smouldering air base as her neighbours suggest that it might be the 11th to fly by. In another video, a man films as several drones fly out of the back of a truck stationed on the side of a highway. A volley of gunfire can be heard in the background as security forces try to shoot the drones down. 'The enemy thought that it could bomb Ukraine and kill Ukrainians with impunity and endlessly. But this is not so.' Lieutenant-General Vasyl Maliuk, Ukrainian SBU security agency In another, a young soldier, apparently stationed at another air base, records several aircraft burning. Facing the camera, he uses an expletive to describe the scene. Enraged chief Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov later demanded that the soldier be shot for making the video and called him a 'scumbag'. Meanwhile, in Kyiv, the SBU, the Ukrainian security agency that had planned the brazen strikes, publicly took credit and revealed the operation's code name as Spiderweb. President Volodymyr Zelensky quickly posted photos of himself hugging the agency head, Lieutenant-General Vasyl Maliuk, in celebration. 'The enemy thought that it could bomb Ukraine and kill Ukrainians with impunity and endlessly,' Maliuk said in a statement Monday. 'But this is not so. We will respond to Russian terror and destroy the enemy everywhere.' Ukraine said that all SBU operatives involved in the attack were evacuated safely from Russia before it began. In Ukraine, the successful attack injected some much-needed optimism into a society beleaguered by more than three years of full-scale war and worn down by what many see as undue pressure from the United States to concede to Russian demands even without security guarantees. 'This operation completely changes the perception of reality – both within Russia and around the world. Our enemies are now forced to recognise that Ukrainian intelligence services are capable of penetrating even the most secure facilities,' Ukrainian lawmaker Roman Kostenko, who serves as the secretary of parliament's national security committee, said. 'When the enemy loses dozens of strategic bombers, it's not just a technical loss; it's a blow to its ability to blackmail the world with missile strikes.' Former Ukrainian defence minister Oleksii Reznikov said Ukraine had transferred its Tu bombers to Moscow as part of its 1996 agreement to give up its nuclear capabilities in exchange for security guarantees from several countries, including Russia. 'On June 1, 2025, Ukraine began removing those very aircraft from one of the memorandum's main guarantors. That guarantor had shamelessly used them against peaceful Ukrainians,' he said, describing Sunday's attack as 'a peculiar form of military-legal sanctions'. One former Ukrainian official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive political moment, described the attack as providing an 'immense inspirational push for Ukrainian society and soldiers' that he fears may inspire more resistance to a compromise that could lead to a real ceasefire. 'We're less likely to compromise in the nearest future. And some form of a compromise seems to be the only way to stop [or] pause the war,' he said. Still, he added, the attack dramatically improved the SBU's reputation and 'deserves to be described in history books'. Vulnerable aircraft The vulnerability of aircraft has long been a point of criticism among Russian military bloggers, who have called for better defences, such as hardened cover and hangars, Samuel Bendett, a drone expert and adviser to the Russia studies program at the Centre for Naval Analyses in Washington, said. Air defences on the bases were probably honed to detect bigger Ukrainian drones that operate at long ranges and were 'probably not looking for FPV drones that literally snuck under the radar', Bendett said. FPV drones are small aircraft guided by a pilot using a camera with a first-person view. A big question is how Russia rebuilds the bruised component of its nuclear arsenal, Bendett said. Among the destroyed or damaged planes are aircraft that have been modernised but are no longer in production. It would not make sense to rebuild propeller-driven Tu-95s, Bendett said, though Russia has yet to acquire the next-generation bombers expected to replace them. Another question is how Ukraine ultimately steered the drones. The sophistication of launching the drones one after another points to capabilities such as drones preprogrammed to fly toward their targets, analysts said. Pilots may have been involved in the last stretch of the attack runs, Bendett said. In one video, a drone slows down and hovers above the wings of a bomber, then targets a vulnerable portion of the wing between the fuselage and the engine, he said. Such a precise attack is a hallmark of FPV drones, which carry relatively small payloads but pack a big punch by specifically targeting vehicle weak points. Russian officials and state media, meanwhile, remained noticeably silent on Sunday's attacks. According to Russian outlet Agentsvo, Russian state broadcasters Channel One and Rossiya-1 each devoted 40 seconds of airtime to this unprecedented attack on distant Russian air bases. By Monday morning, the news had disappeared from news bulletins. 'The smartest thing Putin could do right now would be to not respond immediately,' Vladimir Pastukhov, a Russian political scientist based in London, wrote. 'Putin's best response is to delay his response, which he is good at.' 'Putin does not have many spectacular 'good' moves in the current situation,' he continued. 'Ukraine has no comparable facilities that can be destroyed without infernal civilian casualties and enormous damage to the environment ... which would traumatise the already troubled Trump.' Pro-Kremlin military blogger Mikhail Zvinchuk, who runs the Rybar Telegram channel, said that the attack would cause substantial 'moral and psychological damage' and that Ukraine's operation was aimed not only at exploiting gaps in defence but also at 'creating colossal tension' in society and discrediting the security services. If Ukraine can attack air bases, he speculated, it could also attack highways and transport routes, stirring panic. 'Of course, from the point of view of undermining Russia's military potential, this is an extremely unpleasant story, especially in the context of the loss of the Tu-95MS,' Zvinchuk said, referring to the mainstay of Russia's fleet of nuclear bombers. Russian opposition figures, meanwhile, marvelled online at Ukraine's 'amazing' and 'crazy' operation. 'Everyone says that the only way to negotiate with Putin is to negotiate from a position of strength. Well, here it is,' Russian opposition politician and former political prisoner Ilya Yashin wrote on social media. Yan Matveyev, a military analyst at the Anti-Corruption Foundation, founded by opposition figure Alexei Navalny, described the attack as 'a direct and highly sensitive blow to the nuclear triad' that destroyed 'rare and expensive bombers'. 'Most importantly, it reduced the Russian Air Force's ability to strike Ukrainian cities,' Matveyev wrote on Telegram. Destroying or damaging an A-50 is a significant achievement for Ukraine. The aircraft, topped with a radar, is a flying command centre that helps coordinate Russian air attacks and detects incoming threats. Moscow has few in its inventory: One such plane was shot down with a Ukrainian Patriot air defence system last year.
Sydney Morning Herald
4 hours ago
- Sydney Morning Herald
Anger over drone attack shows Ukraine hit Russia where it hurt
Kyiv: For 18 months, Ukraine's internal security service planned an audacious assault on far-flung Russian airfields - first sneaking drones into Russia, then planting them near key military runways. On Sunday, just ahead of a new round of peace talks, it was go time: Near four unsuspecting Russian military bases, remotely activated roofs lifted off mobile homes and sheds parked on flatbed trucks. Armed Ukrainian drones tucked inside soared upward, then pounced on military aircraft lined up on the runways, engulfing many in flames. The brazen attack – which Ukrainian officials claimed destroyed at least 13 Russian aircraft and damaged dozens of others – shocked Russia and instantly reduced its capabilities to threaten a nuclear attack or launch missile strikes on Ukraine and other countries. It also served as a crucial reminder to Moscow and Ukraine's Western partners that Kyiv remains capable of exploiting Russia's weaknesses and disrupting its war plans, despite being outnumbered and outgunned. Ukraine said the damaged or destroyed aircraft, some of which were nuclear-capable, included A-50, Tu-95, Tu-22 M3 and Tu-160 models – planes Kyiv said Russia had used nearly every night to bomb Ukraine. Many details of how the attack was planned are not public, and it was not immediately clear how many of the Russian planes were operational at the time they were targeted. But the swift, angry reactions in Russia confirmed that Ukraine had exploited, to devastating effect, an obvious vulnerability: essential and expensive aircraft left out in the open but believed safe because they were deep inside the country. The operation also marked the latest example of drone technology redefining modern warfare. Russia and Ukraine met for a brief second round of direct talks in Istanbul on Monday, agreeing to swap dead and captured soldiers, but otherwise, there was no significant progress towards ending the gruelling war or even agreeing to a ceasefire. Western analysts said Ukraine's strikes on Sunday will hinder Russia's ability to launch cruise missiles into Ukraine and could force Russian commanders to shift significant resources to better protect aviation assets. But the analysts cautioned that the strikes are unlikely to significantly alter the course of the war, as Moscow still has enough aircraft to continue bombing Ukrainian cities and infrastructure. Video footage and reactions published on social media showed that in Russia, the drone strikes stirred panic, confusion and then, from pro-war commentators, rage. Governors from several regions, including as far as Siberia, reported drone attacks. Russian onlookers filmed smoke billowing over the airfields and narrated their shock. Soon, pro-war military bloggers had dubbed the attack 'Russia's Pearl Harbour'. In videos that could not be independently verified by The Washington Post, people who appear to be locals living around the air bases recorded drones zooming past them and plumes of black smoke on the horizon. In one video, a woman watches a drone move toward a smouldering air base as her neighbours suggest that it might be the 11th to fly by. In another video, a man films as several drones fly out of the back of a truck stationed on the side of a highway. A volley of gunfire can be heard in the background as security forces try to shoot the drones down. 'The enemy thought that it could bomb Ukraine and kill Ukrainians with impunity and endlessly. But this is not so.' Lieutenant-General Vasyl Maliuk, Ukrainian SBU security agency In another, a young soldier, apparently stationed at another air base, records several aircraft burning. Facing the camera, he uses an expletive to describe the scene. Enraged chief Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov later demanded that the soldier be shot for making the video and called him a 'scumbag'. Meanwhile, in Kyiv, the SBU, the Ukrainian security agency that had planned the brazen strikes, publicly took credit and revealed the operation's code name as Spiderweb. President Volodymyr Zelensky quickly posted photos of himself hugging the agency head, Lieutenant-General Vasyl Maliuk, in celebration. 'The enemy thought that it could bomb Ukraine and kill Ukrainians with impunity and endlessly,' Maliuk said in a statement Monday. 'But this is not so. We will respond to Russian terror and destroy the enemy everywhere.' Ukraine said that all SBU operatives involved in the attack were evacuated safely from Russia before it began. In Ukraine, the successful attack injected some much-needed optimism into a society beleaguered by more than three years of full-scale war and worn down by what many see as undue pressure from the United States to concede to Russian demands even without security guarantees. 'This operation completely changes the perception of reality – both within Russia and around the world. Our enemies are now forced to recognise that Ukrainian intelligence services are capable of penetrating even the most secure facilities,' Ukrainian lawmaker Roman Kostenko, who serves as the secretary of parliament's national security committee, said. 'When the enemy loses dozens of strategic bombers, it's not just a technical loss; it's a blow to its ability to blackmail the world with missile strikes.' Former Ukrainian defence minister Oleksii Reznikov said Ukraine had transferred its Tu bombers to Moscow as part of its 1996 agreement to give up its nuclear capabilities in exchange for security guarantees from several countries, including Russia. 'On June 1, 2025, Ukraine began removing those very aircraft from one of the memorandum's main guarantors. That guarantor had shamelessly used them against peaceful Ukrainians,' he said, describing Sunday's attack as 'a peculiar form of military-legal sanctions'. One former Ukrainian official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive political moment, described the attack as providing an 'immense inspirational push for Ukrainian society and soldiers' that he fears may inspire more resistance to a compromise that could lead to a real ceasefire. 'We're less likely to compromise in the nearest future. And some form of a compromise seems to be the only way to stop [or] pause the war,' he said. Still, he added, the attack dramatically improved the SBU's reputation and 'deserves to be described in history books'. Vulnerable aircraft The vulnerability of aircraft has long been a point of criticism among Russian military bloggers, who have called for better defences, such as hardened cover and hangars, Samuel Bendett, a drone expert and adviser to the Russia studies program at the Centre for Naval Analyses in Washington, said. Air defences on the bases were probably honed to detect bigger Ukrainian drones that operate at long ranges and were 'probably not looking for FPV drones that literally snuck under the radar', Bendett said. FPV drones are small aircraft guided by a pilot using a camera with a first-person view. A big question is how Russia rebuilds the bruised component of its nuclear arsenal, Bendett said. Among the destroyed or damaged planes are aircraft that have been modernised but are no longer in production. It would not make sense to rebuild propeller-driven Tu-95s, Bendett said, though Russia has yet to acquire the next-generation bombers expected to replace them. Another question is how Ukraine ultimately steered the drones. The sophistication of launching the drones one after another points to capabilities such as drones preprogrammed to fly toward their targets, analysts said. Pilots may have been involved in the last stretch of the attack runs, Bendett said. In one video, a drone slows down and hovers above the wings of a bomber, then targets a vulnerable portion of the wing between the fuselage and the engine, he said. Such a precise attack is a hallmark of FPV drones, which carry relatively small payloads but pack a big punch by specifically targeting vehicle weak points. Russian officials and state media, meanwhile, remained noticeably silent on Sunday's attacks. According to Russian outlet Agentsvo, Russian state broadcasters Channel One and Rossiya-1 each devoted 40 seconds of airtime to this unprecedented attack on distant Russian air bases. By Monday morning, the news had disappeared from news bulletins. 'The smartest thing Putin could do right now would be to not respond immediately,' Vladimir Pastukhov, a Russian political scientist based in London, wrote. 'Putin's best response is to delay his response, which he is good at.' 'Putin does not have many spectacular 'good' moves in the current situation,' he continued. 'Ukraine has no comparable facilities that can be destroyed without infernal civilian casualties and enormous damage to the environment ... which would traumatise the already troubled Trump.' Pro-Kremlin military blogger Mikhail Zvinchuk, who runs the Rybar Telegram channel, said that the attack would cause substantial 'moral and psychological damage' and that Ukraine's operation was aimed not only at exploiting gaps in defence but also at 'creating colossal tension' in society and discrediting the security services. If Ukraine can attack air bases, he speculated, it could also attack highways and transport routes, stirring panic. 'Of course, from the point of view of undermining Russia's military potential, this is an extremely unpleasant story, especially in the context of the loss of the Tu-95MS,' Zvinchuk said, referring to the mainstay of Russia's fleet of nuclear bombers. Russian opposition figures, meanwhile, marvelled online at Ukraine's 'amazing' and 'crazy' operation. 'Everyone says that the only way to negotiate with Putin is to negotiate from a position of strength. Well, here it is,' Russian opposition politician and former political prisoner Ilya Yashin wrote on social media. Yan Matveyev, a military analyst at the Anti-Corruption Foundation, founded by opposition figure Alexei Navalny, described the attack as 'a direct and highly sensitive blow to the nuclear triad' that destroyed 'rare and expensive bombers'. 'Most importantly, it reduced the Russian Air Force's ability to strike Ukrainian cities,' Matveyev wrote on Telegram. Destroying or damaging an A-50 is a significant achievement for Ukraine. The aircraft, topped with a radar, is a flying command centre that helps coordinate Russian air attacks and detects incoming threats. Moscow has few in its inventory: One such plane was shot down with a Ukrainian Patriot air defence system last year.
News.com.au
4 hours ago
- News.com.au
‘No one cares': Volodymyr Zelensky dismisses Russian ‘anger' after daring Ukrainian operation
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has declared 'no one cares' whether Vladimir Putin is 'angry' about his country's daring attack on military bases deep inside Russia, rejecting the fears, from some quarters, that it could further escalate the war. The raid, codenamed Operation Spider's Web, took 18 months to plan and execute. Ukraine smuggled drones across the Russian border, hidden in trucks, which then drove to the sites of military bases. One penetrated as far as Siberia, more than 4000 kilometres away from the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv. At a co-ordinated moment, the trucks released their drones, which then attacked while being controlled remotely. Ukraine claims to have wiped out a third of Russia's strategic bombers, a heavy blow to the capabilities of Putin's air force. Ukraine pulled off the extraordinary operation with near-total secrecy, and all its operatives successfully made it back across the border. Even the United States, whose intelligence and military aid have been vital throughout the war, was not warned beforehand. Russia has yet to justify concerns that it might escalate its own violence in response, though Russian-affiliated social media accounts have been sharing ominous quotes, supposedly from Putin himself. The statement in question, repeated verbatim by dozens of accounts, is unattributed and unverified, but may signal the stance of Russian state media. 'They proved that there can be no peaceful solution. They have prepared their own end with this action, there is no more red line, they will regret what they did,' it reads. Mr Zelensky brushed aside worries about an escalation while speaking to reporters today. 'When asked by journalists whether yesterday's operation might enrage the Russians, I responded that just a day earlier, Russia had launched a massive overnight attack on Ukraine, with over 480 drones and missiles,' Mr Zelensky said. 'They struck civilian infrastructure, residential buildings. There were casualties, people killed and injured. This happens every single day. 'Sometimes there's a short pause, and to be honest, we now call it a 'pause' if there's just no one killed that night. But even then, drones still fly, and people still get wounded. We are still talking about dozens of drones and cruise missiles. 'So no, no one cares whether Russia is angry. What matters is that Russia must move towards ending this war. And as a global community, we must do all we can to stop them.' Mr Zelensky prodded the Trump administration, saying Ukraine is 'very much awaiting strong steps from the United States'. 'We hope (Donald Trump) will support sanctions and push Putin to stop this war, or at least to take the first step towards ending it: a ceasefire,' he said. 'These are critical things.' Preliminary talks between Ukraine and Russia, which had been scheduled before Ukraine's operation, went ahead in Istanbul, Turkey as planned overnight. Mr Zelensky claimed the Russian officials sent to Istanbul 'behaved more calmly' and 'modestly' than before – implying the attack had humbled them, somewhat. However the talks delivered little substantive progress. Both sides did agree to exchange prisoners, in an agreement covering all sick and heavily wounded POWs, as well as those under the age of 25. But Russia is still rejecting Ukraine's concerted push for an unconditional 30-day ceasefire. Russia did offer a truce of two or three days across some of the war's frontline. As a condition for a full ceasefire, it demanded that Ukrainian troops withdraw entirely from four regions – Donetsk, Lugansk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson – which it partially occupies. Putin's representatives did also hand over a memorandum, which they framed as a blueprint for a 'lasting peace', though neither side has released details of what's in it. Ukraine said it would take a week to consider the contents. 'The Russian side continued to reject the motion of an unconditional ceasefire,' Ukraine's Deputy Foreign Minister Sergiy Kyslytsya told reporters after the talks. Russia said it had offered a limited pause in fighting. 'We have proposed a specific ceasefire for two to three days in certain areas of the front line,' top negotiator Vladimir Medinsky said, adding that this was needed to collect the bodies of dead soldiers from the battlefield. 'I was told the delegation behaved more calmly than before. But the arrogance? Well, it is what it is,' Mr Zelensky said afterwards. 'These arrogant people acted a little more modestly. Maybe a few more events like this are needed so that everyone will start behaving like decent human beings.' He did, however, accuse Putin of 'playing games' with the talks. 'The key to lasting peace is clear, the aggressor must not receive any reward for war.' Meanwhile Mr Trump, who appears to have lost patience with the peace process having promised, during last year's US election campaign, to end the war within a day of taking office, today said he was 'open' to meeting with both Mr Zelensky and Putin in Turkey, should the opportunity arise. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has proposed that Mr Trump, Mr Zelensky and Putin come together later this month in either Istanbul or Ankara. Putin has thus far refused such a meeting. But Mr Zelensky has said he is willing to do it, underlining that key issues can only be resolved at that level, given Putin's unilateral decision-making power in Russia. White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said Mr Trump 'is open to it, if it comes to that, but he wants both of these leaders and both sides to come to the table together'.
