Ukraine-Russia warfare newest: Kyiv insists Zelensky won’t ever cede territory to Putin forward of peace talks in Moscow

When Olena Horlova leaves home or drives through town outside the southern Ukrainian city of Kherson, she fears that she’s a target. She believes that Russian drones could be waiting on a rooftop, along the road or aiming for her car.

To protect herself and her two daughters, the girls stay indoors, and she stays alert — sometimes returning home at night along dark roads without headlights so as not to be seen.

After living through the occupation, refusing to cooperate with Russian forces and hiding from them, Horlova, like so many other residents, found that even after her town was liberated in 2022, the ordeal didn’t end.

Kherson was among the first places where Russian forces began using short-range, first-person view, or FPV, drones against civilians. The drones are equipped with livestreaming cameras that let operators see and select their targets in real time. The tactic later spread more than 300 kilometers (185 miles) along the right bank of the Dnipro River, across the Dnipropetrovsk, Kherson and Mykolaiv regions.

Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orban said he would meet Russian president Vladimir Putin in Moscow later today to discuss crude and gas supplies for Hungary and also peace efforts in Ukraine.

The Hungarian prime minister has maintained close relations with Moscow despite the war in neighbouring Ukraine, and Hungary is still largely reliant on Russian energy, despite European Union efforts to cut dependence.

US proposals to end the war between Russia and Ukraine offer a starting point for talks, Russian president Vladimir Putin has said, as he told Ukrainian forces to pull back or be overrun by Russia’s bigger army.

“We need to sit down and discuss this seriously,” Mr Putin told reporters at the end of a three-day visit to Kyrgyzstan. “Every word matters.”

He described US president Donald Trump’s plan as “a set of issues put forward for discussion” rather than a draft agreement.

“If Ukrainian troops withdraw from the territories they occupy, hostilities will cease. If they don’t withdraw, we will achieve this by force,” the Russian leader said.

Russian air defence systems intercepted and destroyed 136 Ukrainian drones overnight, the defence ministry said this morning.

More than a half of these drones were shot down over the Rostov and Saratov regions.

Europe is taking baby steps towards walking away from America and ending the Russian threat against its democracies. Tuesday’s meeting of the coalition of the willing, joined by Nato’s Mark Rutte, is further evidence of that. But the time has come to take giant leaps for mankind.

The first move is immediate Nato membership for Ukraine, for Georgia and for Bosnia-Herzegovina.

But a non-Nato, Nato-style alliance of the West would be a powerful entity that would give Putin pause for thought if it acted together and with the sort of confidence the Kremlin has shown on the world stage.

The 12-page spread features flattering images of the 73-year-old doing a variety of activities showcasing his machismo including flipping a man in judo, walking through mountains while looking rugged, and playing the piano.

This year’s publication is also accompanied by a series of inspirational quotes including his advice for August, which reads: “My recipe for energy: Sleep little, work a lot and don’t whine.”

“Not a single sane person today would sign a document to give up territory,” Ukraine’s top negotiator told The Atlantic in a defiant assertion of Kyiv’s red lines.

Andriy Yermak, who has spearheaded Kyiv’s diplomacy with the US over the last week, emerged from talks still confident that Zelensky “will not sign away territory”.

“As long as Zelensky is president, no one should count on us giving up territory,” he said.

The comments were published just hours after Vladimir Putin said that Russia was sticking firm to its maximalist demands, and that Ukraine must lay down its weapons and give up territory for a ceasefire to happen.

Members of the Ukrainian and US delegations are to meet this week to work out a formula discussed at talks in Geneva to bring peace and provide security guarantees for Kyiv, Volodymyr Zelensky has said.

“Our team, together with American representatives, will meet at the end of this week to continue to bring closer the points we have as a result of (talks in) Geneva in a form that will lead us on the path to peace and security guarantees,” Zelensky said in his nightly video address.

“There will be a meeting of delegations. The Ukrainian delegation will be well prepared and focused on meaningful work,” he said.