Russia launches attack on Kyiv ahead of Trump-Zelensky meeting
Russia has attacked Ukraine with hundreds of missiles and drones ahead of peace talks between President Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy and US President Donald Trump are scheduled to meet in Florida on December 28 to hammer out a plan to end the war in Ukraine, but they face deep disagreements over key issues and the Russian airstrike provocation.
Russia on December 27 attacked Kiev and other parts of war-torn Ukraine with hundreds of missiles and drones, cutting off power and heat in parts of the capital. President Zelenskiy called this Russia’s response to ongoing peace efforts brokered by the United States.
President Zelenskiy told reporters that during the meeting with President Trump at his official residence in Florida, they will discuss topics such as the fate of the disputed Donbas region in eastern Ukraine and the future of the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant.
The President of Ukraine and his delegation arrived in Florida late on December 27, Ukrainian Deputy Foreign Minister Serhiy Kislysha told X.
“Good evening, Florida!” Kyslytsya wrote alongside a photo of an aircraft with the U.S. president’s last name on it.
The Kremlin has repeatedly insisted that Ukraine cede all of the Donbass, including areas still under its control in Kiev, and Russian officials have objected to other parts of the latest proposal, raising questions about whether Russian President Vladimir Putin will accept everything that can be gained from the latest talks.
Ukraine’s president told Axios on December 26 that he still wants to soften the US proposal for Ukrainian troops to completely withdraw from Donbas. If that fails, Zelenskiy said the entire 20-point plan, the result of weeks of negotiations, should be put to a referendum.
Axios said U.S. officials see Zelensky’s willingness to hold a referendum as a major step forward and a sign that he no longer rules out territorial concessions, but that Russia must agree to a 60-day ceasefire to allow Ukraine to prepare and hold a referendum. Recent polls suggest that Ukrainian voters may also reject the plan.
A face-to-face meeting between President Zelensky and President Trump is scheduled for 1 p.m. after weeks of diplomatic efforts. European allies are stepping up efforts, sometimes under the radar, to delineate Kiev’s postwar security with U.S. support.
Sticking points across areas
Kiev and the United States have agreed on many issues, and President Zelensky said on December 26 that the 20-point plan was 90% complete. However, the question of what territory, if any, will be ceded to Russia remains unresolved.
Moscow insists on taking all of Donbass, while Kiev wants to freeze the map on the current front.
The United States has sought a compromise, proposing a free economic zone should Ukraine leave the region, but how that zone would work in practice remains unclear.
Zelenskiy, whose previous meetings with Trump have not always gone smoothly, is worried along with his European allies that Trump could sell out Ukraine and force European countries to pay for aid to the devastated country after Russian forces capture between 4.6 and 6.6 square miles of territory per day in 2025.
Russia controls all of Crimea, which it annexed in 2014, and Russia estimates it has controlled about 12% of the territory since its invasion of Ukraine nearly four years ago, including about 90% of Donbass, 75% of Zaporizhzhya and Kherson oblasts, and parts of Kharkiv, Sumy, Mykolaiv and Dnipropetrovsk oblasts.
President Putin said on December 19 that he believes a peace agreement should be based on conditions set for 2024, namely that Ukraine withdraws from all of the Donbass, Zaporizhzhya and Kherson regions, and that Kyiv formally abandons its goal of joining NATO.
Ukrainian officials and European leaders see the war as an imperial-style land grab by Moscow and have warned that if Russia gets its way in Ukraine, it will one day attack NATO allies.
The 20-point plan emerges from a meeting between U.S. special envoy Steve Witkoff, President Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner, and Russian envoy Kirill Dmitriev, and is an outgrowth of a Russian-led 28-point plan released in November.
Subsequent discussions between Ukrainian officials and U.S. negotiators produced a more Kiev-friendly 20-point plan.
European allies rally behind Kiev
After arriving in Halifax, Nova Scotia, and speaking with Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney, President Zelenskiy told reporters that recent airstrikes show that President Putin does not want peace.
In a short statement, Carney and his close aide Zelenskiy said peace “requires a motivated Russia.”
Secretary Carney said of the $1.83 billion in additional economic aid to Ukraine, “The barbarism we saw overnight, the attack on Kiev, shows how important it is that we stand by Ukraine during this difficult time.”
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, who spoke with Zelensky along with other European leaders over the weekend, said on the X show that their common goal remains a “just and lasting peace” that preserves Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity, while strengthening the country’s security and defense capabilities.
President Zelenskiy said that after his meeting with President Trump, he would meet again with European leaders.
(Reporting by Andrea Shalal in Palm Beach, Florida and Gram Slattery in Washington; Editing by Sergio Nonn, Edmund Claman and Christopher Cushing)
