Russia and Ukraine trade drone strikes as Zelenskyy seeks diplomatic path to end war
LONDON -- Three people were killed overnight as Russia continued its aerial barrage of Ukraine, firing at least 166 drones, Ukrainian officials said, as Russian officials also claimed a Ukrainian attack targeting Moscow and other regions.
"At least three people were killed, including a pregnant 22-year-old woman, in Chuhuiv, as a result of Russia’s overnight terrorist attacks on Kharkiv and its region," Andrii Sybiha, the Ukrainian foreign minister, said on social media.
The Ukrainian air force said at least 146 Russian drones had been destroyed.
Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin said in a series of posts on Telegram on Tuesday morning that at least 11 drones had been destroyed by Russian air defenses near the capital. Emergency services were working at the sites where each crashed, he said.
Russia's defenses intercepted and destroyed overnight at least 140 Ukrainian drones in several regions, Russia’s Defense Ministry said, according to the state-affiliated Tass news service.
The overnight attacks came as Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy again said Kyiv was seeking to open a diplomatic path to end Russia’s war.
Zelenskyy told The Guardian in an interview published on Tuesday that Roman Abramovich, a prominent Russian businessman with ties to Russian President Vladimir Putin, had visited Kyiv in May.
"I told this businessman, who came to deliver the message about a potential framework of diplomatic negotiations, that we were ready to speak from the very beginning," Zelenskyy said on social media on Tuesday, recounting what he had told The Guardian. "We didn't want this war, and we want to stop it."
Zelenskyy's office last week published an open letter to Putin in which he asked for a meeting, saying, "The front line today is the line from which diplomacy must begin."
The Ukrainian president said many Russians were "becoming less comfortable" with the effects of the war on daily life, the economy and international relations.
"You will not have enough money or political capital to keep buying the loyalty of Russians the way you have for the past 26 years," Zelenskyy told Putin in the letter. "And we will do everything we can to ensure that the world helps bring that moment closer."
Putin last week again said he believed there was "a desire to end this military conflict peacefully" but stopped short of saying he would meet with his Ukrainian counterpart, according to a transcript released by the Russian president's office.
The overnight strike targeting Ukraine's Kharkiv region injured at least 15 people and damaged residential buildings, along with a church and other civilian infrastructure, Ukraine's Foreign Ministry said on Tuesday.
Russia also targeted emergency responders in the Dnipro region, the ministry said.
"After firefighters had extinguished a blaze caused by an earlier strike, their vehicle came under another Russian attack while returning to base," the ministry said. "Fortunately, no one was injured."
