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Comes as Russia launched hundreds of drones and missiles targeting energy infrastructure and killing at least seven people in Ukraine
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Russia’s top diplomat Sergey Lavrov has said he is ready to meet US Secretary of State Marco Rubio following reports of a rift with President Vladimir Putin.
“Secretary of State Marco Rubio and I understand the need for regular communication,” the Russian Foreign Minister told Russia‘s Ria state agency on Sunday, weeks after efforts to organise a summit between the Russian and US leaders were put on ice.
Lavrov said he is ready to discuss mending bilateral ties as well as the war in Ukraine, repeating that peace cannot be achieved without “taking Russian interests into account”, a phrase Moscow has used to signal it is standing firm in its maximalist demands for Ukraine.
His remarks come after the Kremlin was moved to dismiss mounting speculation that the seasoned Soviet-era diplomat has fallen out of favour with Putin in rumours that emerged after the bilateral summit efforts were put on hold. Among the events fuelling the intrigue was Lavrov’s conspicuous absence from a significant Kremlin meeting he would typically attend this week.
Meanwhile, Russia launched hundreds of drones and missiles targeting energy infrastructure in Ukraine between Friday and Saturday, killing at least seven people.
State-owned energy company Tsentrenergo said the attacks were one of the largest on its facilities since the start of the war in February 2022, and that it had been forced to halt operations at its plants in the Kyiv and Kharkiv regions.
Moscow and Kyiv have traded almost daily assaults on each other’s energy targets as diplomatic efforts to stop the almost four-year war have had no impact on the battlefield.
Ukraine’s long-range drone strikes on Russian refineries aim to deprive Moscow of the oil export revenue it needs to pursue the war. Russia wants to cripple the Ukrainian power grid and deny civilians access to heat, light and running water in what Kyiv officials say is an attempt to “weaponise winter”.
Ukrainian strikes have disrupted power and heating to two major Russian cities near the border, local Russian officials have said.
A drone strike temporarily caused blackouts and cut heating to parts of Voronezh, regional governor Alexander Gusev said. He said several drones were electronically jammed during the night over the city, home to just over one million people, sparking a fire at a local utility facility that was quickly extinguished.
Russian and Ukrainian news channels on Telegram claimed the strike targeted a local thermal power plant.
A missile strike late on Saturday also caused “serious damage” to power and heating systems supplying the city of Belgorod, local governor Vyacheslav Gladkov reported on Sunday morning. Some 20,000 households were affected.
Belgorod has a population of around 340,000 and is the administrative centre of a region of the same name.
Russia’s defence ministry said on Sunday that its forces destroyed or intercepted 44 Ukrainian drones during the night that flew over two south-western regions, Bryansk and Rostov. The statement made no mention of either the Voronezh or Belgorod provinces, nor did it specify how many drones Ukraine launched.
Five people were killed, including four executives of Russian weapons companies, after a helicopter crashed in a village on the Caspian Sea in Dagestan.
Employees of the Kizlyar Electromechanical Plant, which has been subject to EU sanctions, tried to land on a beach when the tail rotor of the Ka-226 helicopter they were flying in broke off.
Footage shows the aircraft spinning before landing on the sand and bursting into flames.
The crash is said to have been caused by a “technical malfunction” according to Nexta, an Eastern European news channel.
The UK is sending military support, including RAF specialists, to Belgium after suspected Russian drone incursions on its airspace, the new chief of Britain’s armed forces has announced.
In a decision made alongside Defence Secretary John Healey, Air Chief Marshal Sir Richard Knighton, the Chief of Defence Staff, the personnel and equipment are now on the way after his Belgian counterpart asked for help earlier this week.
Tara Cobham reports:
Russia’s veteran foreign minister Sergei Lavrov said on Sunday that it would be “impossible” to end the war with Ukraine without addressing the root causes of the conflict and taking Russian interests into account.
It comes amid recent reports that President Vladimir Putin had sidelined the politician after his hardline stance during a phone call with US secretary of state Marco Rubio, leading to the postponing of a highly-anticipated summit between Putin and President Donald Trump.
Local authorities have reported that an emergency shutdown is in place after several districts of the city of Taganrog in southern Russia were left without electricity on Sunday.
They did not mention what had caused the shutdown.
Russia’s defence ministry continued to claim that it had encircled Ukrainian troops in Pokrovsk on Sunday as it said that eight attempts to break out of the encirclement had been repelled, according to IFX.
It added that six Ukrainian attempts to unblocked surrounded units in the Kupiansk area had also been thwarted.
Ukraine denies its troops are surrounded.
Naive, self-sabotaging and riddled with Moscow’s agents, Ukraine gave up its nuclear weapons and an arms industry that produced a third of the Soviet Union’s supply, trusted the West and the Kremlin to protect it – and was left fighting for its life.
Now, thirty years on, the start-up nation redefining how war is fought has been forced into a bodge-and-make-do world of arms production, fusing old technology with IT know-how to break the bonds its allies tied to make Kyiv fight one-handed.
The latest innovation is a cruise missile with a range of 3,000km, a maximum speed of 900km/h and a payload of over a tonne which has been used in strikes deep into Russian territory.
The Independent’s world affairs editor Sam Kiley reports:
State-owned energy company Tsentrenergo said the attacks on its facilities were the largest since the start of the war in February 2022.
It said had halted operations at its plants in the Kyiv and Kharkiv regions.
“The last strike was not even a month ago and the enemy has now struck all our generating capacity at the same time. The stations are on fire!” Tsentrenergo, which generates about 8 per cent of Ukraine’s power, said in a statement.
“Our generation is now zero.”
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