Ukraine’s military said Wednesday it shot down Russian drones that targeted areas of western, central and southern Ukraine.
The Ukrainian air force said it intercepted 13 of 14 Russian drones used in overnight attacks against the Mykolaiv, Kirovohrad and Rivne regions.
Vitaliy Kim, the regional governor of Mykolaiv, said air defenses shot down 11 of the drones in his area. Kim did not report any damage or injuries from the drones.
Russia’s defense ministry said it destroyed an aerial drone and seven rockets over the Belgorod region that borders Ukraine.
Veniamin Kondratyev, the governor of Russia’s Krasnodar region, said Wednesday air defenses downed a Ukrainian drone over the city of Armavir.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy reiterated Tuesday that U.S. President Joe Biden should attend a peace summit next month in Switzerland to send a message to Russian President Vladimir Putin and other world leaders.
Speaking at a joint news conference with Belgian Prime Minister Alexander De Croo in Brussels, Zelenskyy said the peace summit, scheduled for June 15 and 16, will be “organized by the whole world,” and other leaders will be looking to the U.S. response.
Zelenskyy said 90 countries have now committed to the summit, and that Putin fears it because he never believed so many nations would support it.
“[Putin] disrupted this summit and continues to do so. And that is why he is now thinking of setting up a parallel platform,” Zelenskyy said, adding that Putin would applaud Biden’s absence at the summit.
Zelenskyy sent a video on Sunday appealing to Biden to attend the summit. The Ukrainian president recorded the video in a burned-out printing house in Kharkiv that was destroyed last week by Russian missiles.
The White House has been noncommittal about Biden’s attendance, and he is the only leader among the Group of Seven leading industrialized nations that has not accepted the invitation.
Speaking to reporters during a trip to Uzbekistan Tuesday, Putin was asked about the peace conference, and said Russia remains open for talks on ending the war. But rejected the Swiss-hosted round of talks set for next month as an attempt to create a semblance of broad international support for Kyiv.
Zelenskyy was in Brussels on Tuesday, following a trip to Spain, to secure more than $1 billion in new military aid from Belgium in an agreement that includes delivery of 30 F-16 fighter jets.
The Ukrainian leader said the 10-year agreement included cooperating with Belgium on intelligence, cybersecurity, countering disinformation and the defense industry.
Later Tuesday, Zelenskyy traveled to Portugal where he met with Prime Minister Luis Montenegro, and the two leaders signed an agreement for about $140 million in military aid for this year.
European Union defense ministers also met Tuesday in Brussels to discuss military aid for Ukraine. The defense ministers heard from NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg, who suggested Monday that restrictions on Ukraine should be eased to allow it to use Western weapons on targets outside its borders.
Speaking to reporters ahead of Tuesday’s meeting, Stoltenberg maintained that once again, there are legitimate targets outside Ukraine’s borders that can be fired upon as part of its self-defense. He said using NATO-supplied weapons to fire on those targets would not make the alliance part of the conflict.
“We have the right to support Ukraine without becoming a part of the conflict, because we are helping Ukraine to uphold the right for self-defense,” Stoltenberg said.
Speaking in Uzbekistan on Tuesday, Putin warned NATO members there would be “serious consequences” if Western countries allowed Ukraine to use their weapons to strike targets in Russia.
He also accused the West and the United States in particular of seeking to escalate Russia’s war of aggression in Ukraine into a “global conflict.”
Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022.
Some information for this report was provided by The Associated Press, Reuters and Agence France-Press.
