‘No miracles': Russia downplays Ukraine talks as deadly strikes continue

Al Jazeera

6 days ago

Russia has played down expectations of any breakthrough in upcoming talks with Ukraine in Turkiye, as Ukrainian officials said one child was killed and more than 20 people were wounded in overnight Russian attacks.
'We don't have any reason to hope for some miraculous breakthroughs,' Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters on Tuesday, saying this was 'hardly possible in the current situation'.
'We intend to pursue our interests, we intend to ensure our interests and fulfil the tasks that we set for ourselves from the very beginning.'
Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy's announcement late on Monday that talks would take place generated some hope that negotiators would deliver progress on ending the war that began with Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. United States President Donald Trump has been putting more pressure on Russia to hold talks, which have stalled as Russian President Vladimir Putin stood his ground on his demands.
The third round of talks in recent months is expected to be held in Istanbul on Wednesday. Previous negotiations led to a series of exchanges of prisoners of war and the bodies of fallen soldiers, but produced no breakthrough on a ceasefire.
On Tuesday, Zelenskyy announced on social media that Rustem Umerov, the former defence minister and current secretary of the security council, will head Ukraine's delegation.
He also said Ukraine was ready to 'secure the release of our people from captivity and return of abducted children, to stop the killings, and to prepare a leaders' meeting', outlining potential topics for discussion.
Russia has not yet announced the composition of its team for the talks. Its delegation at the previous round was led by a hawkish historian and the current head of the Russian Union of Writers, Vladimir Medinsky, whom Ukraine described as not a real decision-maker.
Asked on Tuesday if he could give a sense of how the Kremlin saw the potential timeframe of a possible peace agreement, Peskov said he could give no guidance on timing.
'There is a lot of work to be done before we can talk about the possibility of some top-level meetings,' Peskov added, a day after Zelenskyy renewed a call for a meeting with Putin.
Despite the upcoming talks, Russia's offensive continues, with its forces driving hard to break through at eastern and northeastern points on the 1,000km (620-mile) front line.
Ukraine's air force said Russia had launched 426 drones and 24 missiles overnight, making it one of Russia's largest aerial assaults in months. It said it had downed or jammed at least 224 Russian drones and missiles, while 203 drones disappeared from radars.
In one of the attacks, a 10-year-old boy was killed and five people were wounded when guided glide bombs hit a residential building in the eastern Ukrainian city of Kramatorsk, according to Mayor Alexander Goncharenko.
Kramatorsk is part of a metropolitan area in Donetsk that remains under Ukrainian control three years after the start of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
A barrage of Russian strikes was also reported in the capital, Kyiv, sparking several fires and damaging an underground air raid shelter where civilians had taken refuge. There were no immediate reports of casualties.
Ukraine's northeastern Sumy region came under multiple waves of attacks, according to regional authorities. A drone hit a petrol station in the town of Putyvl, wounding four people, including a five-year-old boy, the regional military administration reported. A second drone hit the same location less than two hours later, wounding seven people.
Separately, two powerful Russian glide bombs were dropped on Sumy city, wounding at least 13 people, including a six-year-old boy, and damaging five apartment buildings, two private homes and a shopping centre in the attack. The blasts shattered windows and destroyed balconies in residential buildings, acting Mayor Artem Kobzar said.
A few weeks ago, Putin announced his intention to create a 'buffer zone' in the Sumy region, effectively by occupying the Ukrainian border areas.
In the southern Ukrainian port city of Odesa, there were initial reports of drone attacks in which at least one person was wounded. Fires broke out in several places in the city, according to regional media.
Ukraine also launched attacks, with Russia's Ministry of Defence saying its air power had downed 35 Ukrainian long-range drones over several regions overnight, including three over the Moscow area.