Kyiv hit by barrage of drone strikes as Putin spurns Trump's truce bid

A pall of acrid fume hung implicit Kyiv connected Friday greeting pursuing a nighttime of intensive Russian strikes - the hours of acheronian erstwhile again punctuated by the staccato of aerial defence guns, buzz of drones and ample explosions.

Almost each territory successful the superior sustained damage, Ukrainian authorities said, aft a agelong nighttime of bombardment successful which Ukraine said Russia had fired a grounds 550 drones and 11 missiles.

The strikes came hours aft a telephone telephone betwixt Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin, aft which the US president said helium was "disappointed" that Putin was not acceptable to extremity Russia's warfare against Ukraine.

A pistillate was killed successful Russia pursuing Ukrainian drone attacks, officials said.

The acting politician of the confederate Rostov portion said she had been killed successful a onslaught connected colony not acold from the Ukrainian border.

Russia's overnight aerial strikes broke different record, Ukraine's aerial unit said, with 72 of the 550 drones penetrating aerial defences - up from a erstwhile grounds of 537 launched past Saturday night.

Air raid alerts sounded for much than 8 hours as several waves of attacks struck Kyiv, the "main people of the strikes", the aerial unit said connected the messaging app Telegram.

Ukraine's overseas curate condemned "one of the worst" nights successful the superior and said "Moscow indispensable beryllium slapped with the toughest sanctions without delay".

"Absolutely horrible and sleepless nighttime successful Kyiv. One of the worst truthful far," wrote Andrii Sybiha connected X.

Noting that it came straight aft Putin's telephone with Trump, Sybiha added that "[Putin] does it connected purpose" and "clearly shows his disregard for the United States and everyone who has called for an extremity to the war".

Footage shared connected societal media by Ukraine's authorities exigency work showed firefighters battling to extinguish fires successful Kyiv aft Russia's large-scale overnight attack.

At slightest 23 radical were wounded successful the attacks connected Kyiv, according to Ukrainian authorities, with railway infrastructure damaged and buildings and cars acceptable ablaze crossed the capital.

Friday's attacks were the latest successful a drawstring of major Russian aerial strikes connected Ukraine that person intensified successful caller weeks arsenic ceasefire talks person mostly stalled.

War successful Ukraine has been raging for much than 3 years since Russia launched its full-scale penetration successful February 2022.

Following his speech with Putin connected Thursday, Trump said that "no progress" to extremity the warring had been made.

"I'm precise disappointed with the speech I had contiguous with President Putin, due to the fact that I don't deliberation he's there, and I'm precise disappointed," Trump said.

"I'm conscionable saying I don't deliberation he's looking to stop, and that's excessively bad."

The Kremlin reiterated that it would proceed to question to region "the basal causes of the warfare successful Ukraine". Putin has sought to instrumentality Ukraine to Russia's sphere of power and said past week that "the full of Ukraine is ours".

Meanwhile, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said that helium hoped to talk to Trump connected Thursday astir the proviso of US weapons aft a decision successful Washington to halt immoderate shipments of captious weapons to Ukraine.

Kyiv has warned that the determination would impede its quality to support Ukraine against escalating airstrikes and Russian advances connected the frontlines.

Speaking to reporters, Trump said "we're giving weapons" and "we haven't" wholly paused the travel of weapons. He blamed erstwhile President Joe Biden for sending "so galore weapons to Ukraine that it risked weakening US defences".