Russia and Ukraine Trade Major Strikes After Witkoff-Putin Talks
publishers 82articles 112first reported 20 Oct, 13:00 UTCdeveloping since 20 Oct · 11 editions
Russia and Ukraine launched major attacks on each other’s capitals early Thursday, hours after US envoy Steve Witkoff met Russian President Vladimir Putin in St Petersburg to discuss restarting negotiations over the war.
Russia fired more than 20 missiles at Kyiv, killing two people and injuring more than 30, Ukrainian authorities said. The strikes damaged homes, energy facilities, shopping centres, an ambulance station, railway infrastructure and part of the metro near the South Bridge. Ukrainian officials also reported attacks in 11 other regions, including a strike that killed a woman in the Kharkiv region and a drone attack on energy infrastructure in Poltava.
Russian officials said Ukraine launched 630 drones toward the Moscow region, including 163 approaching the capital. Air defences destroyed most of them, according to Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin. At least two people were reported injured around Moscow, while a man was hurt when drones struck buildings in Lipetsk. Moscow airports temporarily suspended operations.
The attacks followed Witkoff’s meetings with Ukrainian and European leaders in Oslo and with Putin on Wednesday. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy backed a US proposal for trilateral negotiations at the negotiator level as soon as possible, while Moscow discussed resuming talks in November.
During the meeting, Putin announced the release of detained American Stephen Hubbard. Witkoff thanked Putin and called him a “humanitarian,” prompting criticism from Zelenskyy, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha, the British government and US lawmakers. Hubbard later left Russia and arrived in the United States.
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Written from 8 articles, 7 with the publisher's own text; 8 independent newsrooms once syndicated copies count as one; this version written 90 h after the record first saw the story; the editor kept it as written.
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