Ukrainian strikes set an oil export terminal and a depot ablaze in St. Petersburg as Kyiv launched more than 1000 drones at Russia in one of its largest aerial attacks of the war.<\/p>\n
The strikes came as tensions between Ukraine and Washington deepened, with US President Donald Trump criticizing Kyiv\u2019s attacks on Russian oil infrastructure and the prospect of further US sanctions against Moscow still uncertain.<\/p>\n
Speaking on NBC\u2019s Meet the Press, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said waiving sanctions against Russia would strengthen Putin\u2019s war effort. He also said US-Ukraine intelligence sharing had resumed after being \u201cblocked for some period of time”.<\/p>\n
Trump told reporters that they did not know what his decision on further sanctions against Russia would be, despite signing an executive order Friday night waiving planned restrictions, citing US national interests.<\/p>\n
Zelensky said that while he trusted Trump, siding with Moscow would be a tragedy and a \u201chistoric mistake\u201d for Washington.<\/p>\n
\u201cPeople want to forget what\u2019s going on. But we can\u2019t give this possibility to forget, or to change reality, or to change the truth,\u201d Zelensky said. \u201cWe can\u2019t compare me and Putin. He\u2019s aggressor. He occupied us. He killed adults and children, his soldiers. He\u2019s a terrorist. And that\u2019s why I hope that President Trump will be very clear with this position.\u201d<\/p>\n
Later, Zelensky said on social media that he had spoken with US presidential envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner about the results of an Oct. 9 meeting between US and Ukrainian negotiating teams in Miami, as well as \u201cnext steps in diplomacy”.<\/p>\n
Two killed as Russia and Ukraine trade blows<\/p>\n
One person was killed and five others were wounded in the St. Petersburg attack, which sparked fires at the Petersburg Oil Terminal and the city\u2019s Ruchi oil depot, local Gov. Alexander Beglov said. A logistics center belonging to Russian retailer Ozon and a data center operated by Russian tech giant VK were also targeted, the companies confirmed.<\/p>\n
Russia\u2019s Defense Ministry said that its forces had destroyed 1,015 Ukrainian drones over 15 Russian regions, the annexed Ukrainian peninsula of Crimea and the Black Sea.<\/p>\n
Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told Russian state news agency Tass that Kyiv was \u201cresisting\u201d Moscow\u2019s invasion but could not \u201cchange the current course of events”.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, in Ukraine, a woman was killed and a 6-year-old girl was among at least two other people wounded in two Russian attacks on the southern Ukrainian city of Zaporizhzhia, local officials said.<\/p>\n
Russia continues energy attacks, Kyiv says<\/p>\n
Trump announced on Oct. 11 that Russia and Ukraine had agreed to an \u201cenergy ceasefire\u201d in the 4\u00bd-year-old war, but offered no details. Kyiv reported Russian attacks on energy sites continued after Trump’s announcement, and on Thursday said it had resumed strikes on Russian oil facilities after a three-day pause.<\/p>\n
Zelenskyy wrote on X that Russia had attacked Ukraine\u2019s energy, oil and gas sectors 76 times in the week since Trump\u2019s announcement. The Ukrainian government initially said it was observing the ceasefire.<\/p>\n
Energy facilities in four Ukrainian regions were struck overnight, leaving tens of thousands of families without power, he said, accusing Russia of trying to cause a blackout.<\/p>\n
\u201cAmerica should see that Russia is not taking any reciprocal steps in response to sanctions relief or agreements. On the contrary, they take every signal of an opportunity to make money as proof that their bet on war is paying off and they can keep fighting,\u201d he wrote.<\/p>\n
Zelenskyy also stressed that the war was continuing because of Russia\u2019s invasion, not Ukraine\u2019s efforts to defend itself. \u201cIt is Russia that must face pressure for peace to have a chance.”<\/p>\n
Ukraine apology to Lithuania over drone alert<\/p>\n
Ukraine’s Foreign Ministry apologised after a drone entered Lithuania\u2019s airspace, prompting authorities to issue an air raid warning.<\/p>\n
Russian electronic warfare may have diverted the drone during a Ukrainian operation against legitimate military targets in Russia, ministry spokesperson Heorhii Tykhyi said in a statement.<\/p>\n
Lithuanian authorities urged residents in two northern counties along the Latvian border to take cover early Sunday (local time) because of a possible drone incursion, public broadcaster LRT reported.<\/p>\n
A drone entered the northern Pasvalys region and damaged a moving car, LRT said, citing Lithuania\u2019s National Crisis Management Center. No injuries were reported.<\/p>\n
The morning’s headlines in 90 seconds, including a cyclone hits the Cook Islands, and the FlyDubai pilot speaks about being attacked. (Source: Breakfast)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ukrainian strikes set an oil export terminal and a depot ablaze in St. Petersburg as Kyiv launched more…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":634748,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[42,43,1979,40,38,41,39],"class_list":["post-634747","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-russia-invades-ukraine","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/634747","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=634747"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/634747\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/634748"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=634747"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=634747"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=634747"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}