Ukraine

For the sixth time this year, U.S. President Donald Trump sent his special envoy, Steve Witkoff, to Moscow — this time accompanied by Jared Kushner — and once again returned with cordial meetings but no breakthrough on a cease-fire or an enduring peace settlement for Ukraine. The repeat mission underscores a familiar pattern: U.S. interlocutors sit down with senior Russian officials, describe the talks as constructive, and leave with little to show except the prospect of more discussions. “Compromises have not been found…

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky will meet French President Emmanuel Macron in Paris on Monday as Kyiv faces a deepening political crisis and renewed frontline pressure, the Elysee Palace said. The visit, announced by the French presidency, comes days after Zelensky reorganised his office and dismissed his chief of staff, Andriy Yermak, following an anti-corruption raid that has shaken public confidence at a critical moment in the war with Russia. Macron and Zelensky are expected to discuss "the conditions of a just…

Trump backs off Ukraine peace deadline as US envoy heads to Moscow amid reports of coaching Russians WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump on Thursday withdrew a firm Thanksgiving deadline for Ukraine to accept a U.S.-backed peace framework and defended the administration’s negotiators after reports the lead envoy advised Russian officials how to press the proposal. Speaking aboard Air Force One en route to Florida, Trump said U.S. negotiators were making progress with both sides and that Moscow had agreed to “some…

European leaders and a self-described "coalition of the willing" moved quickly to blunt a U.S. plan for ending the war in Ukraine that has roiled diplomatic circles at the G20 summit in Johannesburg, exposing a transatlantic fracture over how — and on whose terms — the conflict should end. French President Emmanuel Macron said the 30 countries backing Kyiv will hold a video meeting Tuesday to coordinate a response after talks in Geneva on the U.S. proposal, which has drawn sharp criticism from European capitals for…

US President Donald Trump on Thursday pressed Ukraine to accept a US-brokered plan to end the war with Russia that would cede significant territory to Moscow, setting a firm deadline of Nov. 27 — the American Thanksgiving holiday — and saying Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky "will have to like it." "He'll have to like it, and if he doesn't like it, then you know, they should just keep fighting," Trump told reporters in the Oval Office, responding to questions about Zelensky's lukewarm and public rejection of the…

Russia strikes Ternopil; 25 dead, including three children, after overnight missile and drone barrage TERNOPIL, Ukraine — A Russian missile and drone strike on the western Ukrainian city of Ternopil killed 25 people, including three children, and wounded another 73, the interior ministry said, in one of the deadliest attacks on the country’s west since the 2022 invasion. "Twenty-five people, including three children, were killed as a result of Russian shelling of the city. Another 73 people, including 15 children, were…

Ukraine says it struck a Russian oil refinery in the Ryazan region near Moscow, a day after Russian strikes on Kyiv that left several dead. The moves come amid an unfolding corruption scandal in Ukraine’s energy sector and continued frontline incidents with power infrastructure at risk. Attack near Moscow Ukrainian forces reported hitting a refinery in Russia’s Ryazan region, saying the strike aimed to reduce Moscow’s ability to launch missile and bomb strikes. Russian officials said air defences intercepted a large number…

Seventeen South Africans trapped in Donbas spotlight a growing, ugly global trade in fighters Seventeen South African men — sixteen reportedly from KwaZulu‑Natal and one from the Eastern Cape — have been left stranded in Ukraine’s embattled Donbas region after answering offers that promised steady pay and work abroad. The men say they were recruited for what they believed would be lucrative civilian jobs, only to discover they were expected to join armed units in one of the war’s most dangerous theaters. The episode,…

Russian drone and missile strikes kill at least two, wound more than a dozen across Ukraine Kyiv — Russian missile and drone strikes overnight hit multiple regions of Ukraine, killing at least two people and injuring more than a dozen as the country heads into a fourth winter of war, regional officials said Friday. Vladyslav Gaivanenko, head of the Dnipropetrovsk regional military administration, said two people were killed and seven others wounded when missiles and drones struck residential and commercial areas. “Fires…

Putin’s nuclear drills, a postponed summit and the widening war of attrition For two leaders who flirted with the idea of a quick, high-stakes meeting, the choreography of power this week looked less like summit diplomacy than a careful mutual stand-off. Moscow staged a large-scale training exercise that it said included intercontinental ballistic missiles capable of striking the United States, and Washington announced a pause in plans for a second Vladimir Putin–Donald Trump summit as diplomacy over Ukraine staggered back…