Russia pummels Kyiv before Trump-Zelenskyy meeting

DARREN CALABRESE / REUTERS

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy arrives to meet with Canada’s Prime Minister Mark Carney in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada, today.

KYIV, Ukraine >> Russia pounded the Ukrainian capital with waves of missiles and attack drones today, an hourslong assault that came the day before President Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Ukraine’s scheduled meeting in Florida with President Donald Trump to discuss a plan to end the war.

Two people were killed — one person in the suburbs of Kyiv and one in the city itself, according to local authorities. At least 32 other people were wounded.

Zelenskyy said the attack made clear that Russia was not serious about peace talks.

“Russian representatives engage in lengthy talks, but in reality, Kinzhals and ‘shaheds’ speak for them,” he wrote on social media, using the names of ballistic missiles and attack drones. “This is the true attitude of Putin and his inner circle. They do not want to end the war and seek to use every opportunity to cause Ukraine even greater suffering.”

Speaking to reporters on his way to Florida, Zelenskyy said today that he would first stop in Canada and that the attack on Kyiv underscored the need for continued support from Ukraine’s allies as the country grapples with air-defense shortages.

The attack began around 1:30 a.m. local time, heralded by the blare of air-raid sirens as local authorities warned residents of Kyiv to take cover.

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“Explosions in the capital,” the city’s mayor, Vitali Klitschko, wrote on Telegram. “Air defense forces are operating. Stay in shelters!,”

Soon after, an eerie blue-and-white light flickered in the sky over part of the city, suggesting that an energy facility may have been hit. Blasts and the thunder of air defenses firing sounded through the night and late into the morning, when thick plumes of gray smoke rose above the Kyiv skyline.

Ukraine’s air force said Russia had launched 40 missiles and 519 drones in the bombardment, which lasted nearly 10 hours.

Firefighters scrambled to extinguish blazes at multiple locations hit by strikes, including a university dormitory and residential high-rises.

Two emergency workers hung from a crane outside one of those high-rise buildings this afternoon, clinging to what was left of the fourth and fifth floors while chipping away at its loose pieces. The side of the 21-story building was ripped off, exposing a cement structure and insulation.

Emergency workers perched precariously on what had been the ceiling of the fourth floor but was now bent in half and missing a chunk, shoveling debris off the side to the ground below.

There, a lone municipal worker filled and refilled a black garbage bag with pieces of insulation, metal and plastic that littered the ground, before emptying the debris onto a growing pile.

Firefighters, one eating a hot dog, mingled on the sidewalk, and traffic slowly built on the main road as Kyiv residents carried on with their days.

But power outages still affected many areas of the city, and nearly a third of the capital was without heat as a result of the strikes, Klitschko said, as temperatures hovered below freezing.

At Zelenskyy’s scheduled meeting Sunday with Trump, the two leaders are expected to discuss the latest version of a 20-point draft peace plan that was developed with the United States. The proposal covers a wide range of issues, including security guarantees that Ukraine wants to prevent future Russian aggression.

Zelenskyy said today’s attacks further emphasized the need for those guarantees, which were expected to feature in his discussion with Trump.

While the Ukrainian leader had said Friday that the 20-point plan was “90% ready,” Trump later told Politico that the Ukrainian leader “doesn’t have anything until I approve it.”

“So we’ll see what he’s got,” Trump said.

Analysts say Russia is unlikely to accept the proposal. Still, Trump told The New York Post on Friday that he believed there was a “good shot” that Ukraine and Russia were ready to broker a peace deal.

“I think they want to do it now, and I think that Russia wants to do it,” he said.

In Kyiv today, standing in the cold as firefighters flung debris from the roof of his girlfriend’s damaged building, Oleksandr Verbetskyi, 47, expressed deep skepticism at Trump’s sentiments.

Verbetskyi said he had been browsing online for holiday presents at his girlfriend’s when a blast hit just before 11 a.m. The couple suffered only scratches but the apartment sustained heavy damage, he said, pointing to its lost roof. The fifth-floor apartment is now “on the fourth and a half,” he said, laughing at his grim joke.

Verbetskyi said that Russia’s word in negotiations was worth less than the paper it might be printed on, and that he had no confidence Moscow intended to make peace.

“We know,” he said, “that we cannot trust Russians.”

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

© 2025 The New York Times Company

See more:Russia Attacks UkraineWorld news

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