kyiv, Ukraine (AP) — Ukraine overnight fired nearly 1,200 drones at Russian targets in one of its largest aerial attacks since The full-scale invasion of Moscow almost five years ago.
Meanwhile, American and Russian negotiators have upped the ante. talks to stop the fighting by including in the discussion the broader European security arrangements that have been in place since the end of the Cold War. This change, long sought by Moscow, has European leaders have alarmed and posed a question mark over the future role of NATO.
“Russia wants to talk about the issues of the European security architecture. We don’t need to talk about it. There is one,” said German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, referring to NATO.
After two days of discussions with the Russian and Ukrainian delegations in Abu Dhabi this week, the American envoys informed Russian President Vladimir Putin in the Kremlin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who was in Dublin, Ireland, to meet European leaders.
More talks are planned as negotiators seek a breakthrough in peace efforts, according to U.S. envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner.
A team of diplomats Representatives from the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Italy, Poland and the European Union will take part in the negotiations, European Council President Antonio Costa said after a meeting in Dublin. The session was dominated by European efforts to avoid being left out of the US-led negotiations.
Kushner, who is also President Donald Trump’s son-in-law, said Russia had agreed to include Europe in the upcoming negotiations, after Moscow had long insisted that governments on the continent be excluded because they supported Ukraine.
Europe’s presence at the table will allow negotiators “to address broader post-war European security arrangements as well as territorial issues between Ukraine and Russia,” Kushner said on X.
European leaders remain cautious about Russian initiatives
European leaders are wary of Russian maneuvers and those of Trump. praise of Putin and its administration harsh criticism of Europe.
The EU’s top diplomat, Kaja Kallas, said Europe must insist on a ceasefire before continuing negotiations – the opposite of what Putin demands.
“If we start talking about what Russia is asking for in terms of security architecture, we are actually falling into the traps that Russia is setting for us,” she said in Dublin.
Luxembourg Prime Minister Luc Frieden insisted that Europe must take its fate into its own hands. “We cannot let either the Americans or the Russians decide our future,” Frieden said.
Moscow aims “to dismantle NATO and the post-Cold War European security architecture,” the Institute for the Study of War said in an assessment Thursday.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov reaffirmed that Russia was open to contacts with Europeans.
“Once we understand (Europe’s) true intentions and their desire to facilitate the peace process, then it will be possible to make a decision to initiate a dialogue on a settlement in Ukraine in an expanded format,” he said.
Ukraine Raises Starlink Issues Again
Zelensky on Friday reiterated his complaints about drone speed limits on the American Starshield system — SpaceX’s military version of the Starlink satellite internet service — which Ukraine needs for its defense.
Speed restrictions limit Ukrainian drones to 161 km/h (100 mph) across the entire front line and in Russian-occupied territory, he explained, making it impossible for kyiv to effectively deploy its interceptors against Moscow’s fast-reaction drones.
“We still don’t have a clear explanation,” he said of the unannounced restrictions, after first raising the issue on Thursday.
Ukrainian officials are calling on the U.S. State Department, the Pentagon and SpaceX to clarify and resolve the situation, he said.
Last month, similar limits imposed by SpaceX on the speed of Ukrainian drones severely disrupted operations, alarming kyiv officials who fear a decline in U.S. support.
Elon Musk admitted in October that his company SpaceX limited Starlink internet service in Ukraine for about a week, saying the system could not be used for offensive strikes against Russia.
Ukraine deploys drones and robots against Russia
The Russian Defense Ministry said air defense downed 1,198 long-range Ukrainian drones between Thursday evening and Friday morning. However, strikes on three Russian regions killed seven people, including a 12-year-old child, and injured 17 others, local officials said.
Ukraine’s General Staff said it hit an oil refinery in the Russian city of Volgograd, sparking a fire. The refinery has a capacity of about 110 million barrels per year, he said.
The massive barrage of Ukrainian drones appeared intended to show that kyiv is holding strong in the war, countering Moscow’s insistence that a Russian victory is inevitable. Ukraine has repeatedly hit Russian refineries, saying last month that it neutralized more than half of Russia’s refining capacity.
kyiv’s forces are using drones and ground robots to defend against the Russian army along the roughly 1,200-kilometer (750-mile) front line that snakes toward eastern and southeastern Ukraine.
With its troops largely bogged down on the battlefield, Moscow has resorted to strategic bombing of civilian areas to harm Ukraine.
Attacks cause power outages in 12 Ukrainian regions
Russia launched 117 drones against Ukraine overnight, killing at least two people, including a 17-year-old boy, authorities said.
A single Russian attack Friday in southern Zaporizhzhia hit two five-story buildings and injured 30 people, including six children, officials said.
The war has killed hundreds of thousands of soldiers and thousands of civilians, analysts and aid organizations say.
Russian attacks on Ukraine’s energy infrastructure caused widespread power outages in about half of the country’s regions on Friday, First Deputy Energy Minister Artem Nekrasov said.
Moscow knocked out Ukraine’s power grid every winter during the war, hoping to weaken public morale.
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AP reporters Sam McNeil in Dublin, Susie Blann in kyiv, Ukraine, and Barry Hatton in Lisbon, Portugal, contributed.
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Follow AP’s coverage of the war in Ukraine at https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine
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