Ukraine war briefing: Zelenskyy says peace negotiations ‘must be stepped up'

The Guardian

20-07-2025

Kyiv has proposed to Moscow a new round of peace talks next week, Ukraine's president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, said on Saturday in the hours after Russian strikes across Ukraine claimed more lives. 'Security council secretary Umerov … reported that he had proposed the next meeting with the Russian side for next week,' Zelensky said in his evening address. 'The momentum of the negotiations must be stepped up.'
At talks last month, Russia outlined demands including Ukraine ceding more territory and rejecting all forms of western military support. Kyiv dismissed them as unacceptable and at the time questioned the point of further negotiations if Moscow was not willing to make concessions. Two rounds of talks in Istanbul between Moscow and Kyiv have failed to result in any progress towards a ceasefire, instead yielding large-scale exchanges of prisoners and the bodies of soldiers.
Russia launched a massive attack on Ukraine overnight into Saturday with hundreds of drones, killing at least one person. Zelenskyy said Russia fired more than 300 drones, along with more than 30 cruise missiles, into 10 regions. Russia now often batters Ukraine with more drones in a single night than it did during some entire months in 2024, and analysts say the barrages are likely to escalate.
Two people died after a Russian missile hit Ukraine's central Dnipropetrovsk region, an important industrial hub, into which Russia's forces have recently advanced. Russia launched its biggest ever attack on the eastern Ukrainian city of Pavlohrad early on Saturday, as part of the large wave of strikes across the country. According to the regional governor, Sergiy Lysak, the strike destroyed 'an outpatient clinic, a school and a cultural institution' in the Vasylkivska township, with some private houses and cars damaged as well.
One person died in the Black Sea port city of Odesa, which was hit with more than 20 drones and a missile, said the mayor, Hennadii Trukhanov, while five people were rescued from a fire in a residential high-rise building. According to Zelenskyy, six other people were wounded in the attack on Odesa, including a child, and critical infrastructure was damaged in Ukraine's north-eastern Sumy region.
Russia's defence ministry said it shot down 71 Ukrainian drones overnight into Saturday. The Moscow mayor, Sergei Sobyanin, said 13 drones were shot down as they approached the Russian capital. Russia had to suspend trains for about four hours, causing extensive delays in the southern Rostov region, when it came under a Ukrainian drone attack that wounded one railway worker.
Ukraine's foreign minister accused Russia on Saturday of deporting Ukrainian citizens into Georgia and leaving them stranded without proper identification. Andrii Sybiha said Moscow has escalated the practice of expelling Ukrainians – many of whom are former prisoners – across its southern border with Georgia, instead of returning them directly to Ukraine. 'Dozens of people, many of whom lack proper documentation, have been stuck in the transit zone.' That amounted to Russia 'weaponising the deportation of Ukrainian citizens', he added. There was no immediate response from Moscow.