Zelenskiy pushes for November talks, Kyiv hit by attack
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President Volodymyr Zelenskiy says Ukraine supports a US proposal for three-way talks with Russia and the United States at the level of negotiators to be held as soon as possible, preferably no later than early November.
Zelenskiy, speaking to journalists on WhatsApp as he returned to Kyiv from Norway, said he had spoken to US officials after presidential envoy Steve Witkoff’s talks in St Petersburg with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
“We have received feedback that… Russia supports a trilateral meeting at the level of our (negotiating) teams,” he said.
“The American side has proposed holding it as soon as possible and we support that…The Ukrainian side has been in contact with its American partners. They will do everything to ensure that the meeting takes place as early as possible, in November. I think no later than early November.”
Zelenskiy said Kyiv supported “any proposals for a ceasefire, an end to the war, an energy ceasefire as well as humanitarian initiatives”.
Earlier, the Kremlin said Putin agreed to resume US-mediated peace talks with Ukraine as soon as next month.
Witkoff met Putin a day after holding talks with Zelenskiy in Oslo amid concerns in Kyiv and among its allies that the United States was backing away from Ukraine.
After the meeting, Kremlin foreign affairs adviser Yuri Ushakov told reporters the Russian leader had agreed “in principle” to resume trilateral talks after November 10.
No such talks have taken place since February.
Ushakov said the negotiations should focus on security guarantees for Russia and Ukraine after the conflict ends.
Witkoff’s meetings suggested leaders are keen to bring new momentum to US-led peace efforts, more than four-and-a-half years after Russia’s army invaded.
The meeting coincided with Russia releasing retired American teacher Stephen Hubbard, who had been jailed on charges of fighting as a mercenary in Ukraine.
Efforts by the Trump administration since early 2025 to end the war have made no significant progress, and Russia and Ukraine are still far apart in their terms for a settlement, as their armies remain locked on the battlefield and they pummel each other with daily long-range strikes.
Trump said on October 11 that Russia and Ukraine had agreed to a ceasefire in attacks on energy infrastructure but Russia has kept hammering Ukraine’s power grid and Kyiv has hit Russian oil refineries.
After the Witkoff meeting, the Kremlin also said China was working to prepare a possible three-way summit with Putin, Trump and Chinese leader Xi Jinping in November during the APEC summit in China.
At the White House on Tuesday, Trump increased the pressure on Zelenskiy to come to an agreement with Russia as relations between the two men have soured again.
“We want Zelenskiy to make a deal,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office.
“We’ve given a lot to Ukraine. We’ve gotten absolutely nothing back except grief, death, tremendous monetary loss.”
On the battlefront, Russian forces attacked Kyiv with ballistic missiles on Wednesday evening, damaging homes and a petrol station and causing injuries, officials said.
The city’s military administration said missiles hit some private homes, as well as a petrol station on the eastern side of the Dnipro River that bisects the city.
It said there were injuries, but provided no details.
Mayor Vitali Klitschko said on Telegram the city had come under missile attack and urged residents to remain in shelters.
Reuters witnesses reported explosions in the city.
With Reuters and EFE
AP