Russia carried out a heavy aerial attack on Ukraine that included cluster munitions, just hours after Russian President Vladimir Putin met a US envoy in St Petersburg to discuss the resumption of peace talks.
Moscow unleashed a barrage of more than 20 missiles on Kyiv overnight that killed two people and injured more than 30, Ukrainian authorities said.
Ukraine president Volodymyr Zelenskiy said three ballistic missiles that hit the capital had been equipped with cluster warheads designed to spread damage over a wide area.
One exploded in the historic Pechersk district in the city centre and damaged several restaurants, shops and monastery buildings.
“The choice of weapon was deliberate, the choice of target area was deliberate, and so was the intent to inflict as much loss and damage on civilians as possible,” Zelenskiy wrote on X.
He added that Ukrainian intelligence services warned that Russia would amplify its air campaign in the coming weeks and was “taking advantage of the slowdown in air defence supplies from our partners”.
Kyiv also launched more than 600 drones towards Moscow, where three people were injured, according to Russian officials
The Russian strikes follow a renewed US diplomatic push, with president Donald Trump’s envoy Steve Witkoff meeting Zelenskiy and several European leaders in Oslo this week.
Witkoff then headed to St Petersburg for talks on Wednesday with Putin, whom the envoy hailed as a “humanitarian”.
US special envoy Steve Witkoff meeting Russia’s president Vladimir Putin in St Petersburg on Wednesday. Photograph: Gavriil Grigorov/AFP/Getty Images
Witkoff and Putin discussed resuming talks with Ukraine in mid-November, and a possible leaders’ summit between China, Russia and the US in Shenzhen next month, according to Russian officials.
Russia did not commit to renewed talks, while European officials familiar with the Oslo discussions are sceptical the US diplomatic push is making headway.
“Almost immediately after another round of talks, Russia launched a pointed attack,” wrote Zelenskiy on Thursday. “This means there has been no real change in its attitude towards everything that is happening,” he added.
Kyiv mayor Vitali Klitschko said the attack damaged an ambulance station as well as metro infrastructure near the city’s South Bridge, a key thoroughfare over the Dnipro river.
Authorities recorded damage across six districts. A shopping centre in the Obolonskyi district was also heavily damaged in the attack.
“Overnight, Kyiv residents heard what Russian ‘humanism’ truly sounds like,” Ukraine’s foreign minister Andriy Sybiha wrote on X.
“Appeasement, servility and flattery will not stop this war. Only strength will.”
Meanwhile, Russian officials said that Ukrainian drones overnight had injured three people. Moscow’s airports suspended operations for several hours overnight, and media reports said a military facility, the 75th arsenal, had been damaged.
The attack was the third largest this year by the number of drones launched towards the Russian capital, according to the tallies reported by Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin.
Zelenskiy told journalists late on Wednesday that Kyiv had “received feedback” that Ukraine, Russia and the US had agreed to revive trilateral talks, which were put on ice at the onset of the war in Iran earlier this year.
Zelenskiy said they hoped the negotiating teams would meet in early November, though no date has been confirmed.
The talks this week failed to deliver concrete progress, even as Kyiv pushed for an energy ceasefire to stop Russia from pummelling Ukrainian power plants and energy infrastructure in advance of winter. Trump has repeatedly demanded that Ukraine cease its own strikes targeting Russian refineries and oil terminals.
Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said in a Thursday press briefing that Abu Dhabi was being considered as the venue for a three-way meeting between Russia, the US and Ukraine, though he said no decision had been made on who would represent Moscow.
Moscow sees “the increasing activity of certain European capitals trying to understand what is going on”, said Peskov, but added Russia’s interests were not being taken into account.
“It seems we are still a long way from such objective statements,” he said. US media reported that Trump hoped to secure a peace agreement at the G20 summit in Miami in December, but Peskov said no decision had been made on whether Putin would travel to the event.
Ukraine’s air force said 210 long-range drones also took part in the attack on Kyiv overnight and said it had shot down 181 of the unmanned aerial vehicles.
The report did not mention any missile intercepts, highlighting Ukraine’s enduring shortage of sophisticated anti-air missiles even as Moscow expands its campaign against Ukrainian energy infrastructure.
Zelenskiy complained to US senators on Monday that “the Pentagon is delaying the delivery” of crucial interceptor missiles Kyiv relies on to protect its cities against Russian ballistic missile launches.
– Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2026. Additional reporting: Guardian