Ukraine’s long-range drones destroy Russian jet on military base
Ukraine said its long-range drones shot down two Russian Su-27 fighter jets worth $70 million in occupied Crimea.
Ukraine’s SBU security services said on Saturday that one of the planes was on the runway ready for a combat sortie when it was blown up and destroyed. A second plane was also damaged in the attack on the Belbek military airport in Russia-occupied Crimea.
The attack followed a separate operation a day earlier in which the SBU said it had hit a Russian shadow fleet ship crossing the Mediterranean; this was the first such attack in these waters since the start of the war.
Ukraine said the Belbek operation was the second successful attack on the airport in recent days.
“On December 18, our drones hit Russian equipment worth hundreds of millions of dollars,” the SBU wrote, citing a Pantsir-S2 air defense system, two Nebo-SVU radars and a MiG-31 aircraft, among other military objects.
The strike comes as U.S. and Russian officials prepare for new talks in Florida on Saturday aimed at ending Russia’s war in Ukraine.
Ukraine shot down two Russian Su-27 fighter jets in Crimea – SBU
Vladimir Putin’s envoy Kirill Dmitriev criticized “warmongers” [who] “Continue to work overtime to undermine the US peace plan for Ukraine.”
Mr. Dmitriev, who heads Russia’s sovereign wealth fund, will lead the Russian delegation in talks with Steve Witkoff, Washington’s traveling envoy and a former real estate tycoon, and Jared Kushner, Donald Trump’s son-in-law.
Mr. Witkoff and Mr. Kushner met with a Ukrainian delegation led by Rustam Umerov in Miami on Friday. Previous discussions in Berlin with Ukrainian and European officials.
Mr. Umerov said after the talks that Ukraine “agreed with our American partners on further steps and to continue our joint work in the near future.”
The latest rounds of negotiations were held in a bilateral format, with US representatives meeting separately with Russian and Ukrainian officials.
But Volodymyr Zelensky suggested on Saturday that the United States was discussing a new format involving direct talks between Ukraine and Russia with the participation of American and possibly European envoys.
“The United States said they would hold a separate meeting with representatives of Russia. And as far as I understand, they suggested the following format: Ukraine, America, Russia, and since there are representatives of Europe there, probably Europe too,” the Ukrainian president told reporters in Kiev.
Volodymyr Zelensky suggests US proposes direct talks between Ukraine and Russia – Sergey Dolzhenko/EPA/Shutterstock
Ukrainian and Russian representatives have not met face-to-face since fruitless talks in July, when they met in Istanbul but failed to advance talks beyond a prisoner swap. A Russian source told Reuters a meeting between Mr Dmitriev and Ukrainian negotiators had been ruled out.
Western officials this week reported progress on security guarantees for Kiev, but it remains unclear whether Moscow will accept those terms.
Earlier this month, it was reported that Mr Trump’s envoys were pressuring Mr Zelensky to accept a US-brokered deal by Christmas.
Vladimir Putin threatened to cut off Ukraine from the sea – Mikhail Metzel/Sputnik/EPA/Shutterstock
But on Friday, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the US would not impose a ceasefire agreement on Kiev.
“There is no peace agreement unless Ukraine agrees,” Mr. Rubio said at a news conference in Washington.
Ahead of the talks, Ukraine’s State Emergency Service said eight people were killed and 27 injured after a civilian bus was caught in the shelling during Russia’s attacks on port infrastructure in the Odessa region.
Most of the region’s population of more than two million were left without electricity for a week; Heating and water supplies have also been disrupted by Russia’s increasing attacks on the coastline.
Zelensky said about the attacks on Saturday: “Russia is once again trying to restrict Ukraine’s access to the sea and block our coastal areas.”
Earlier this month, Putin threatened what he called the “radical” option of cutting off Ukraine from the sea in response to a series of attacks on Russia’s tanker fleet.
However, Kyiv has signaled that it is determined. On Saturday, the Ukrainian General Staff announced that it had carried out kamikaze drone attacks on a Russian warship in the Caspian Sea and a nearby Russian oil platform.
