Russia launched a large-scale drone attack on the Ukrainian city of Kharkiv overnight as Donald Trump’s special envoy, Keith Kellogg, said the US president was growing “frustrated” with his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin over delays in reaching a cease-fire to help bring an end to Europe’s deadliest conflict since World War II.
Oleh Syniehubov, head of the Kharkiv region that borders Russia, said in a post on Telegram that at least eight people were injured in the attack early on May 30, including two children. Mayor Ihor Terekhov said the strikes targeted “a municipal enterprise.” He gave no further details.
Russia has pounded Ukrainian targets in recent weeks amid intensified pressure to agree to a cease-fire to pave the way for a comprehensive peace plan more than three years after the Kremlin launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
Ukraine agreed in April to a US proposal for a 30-day cease-fire, but Russia has balked at the plan and many of Ukraine’s allies have accused Putin of trying to drag out the process so he can take advantage of the current situation on the battlefield, where Russia has been gaining ground in territories it claims to rule.
Much of the destruction has been centered around civilian infrastructure, which Russia claims it doesn’t target despite mounting evidence that appears to show the opposite.
“His [Trump’s] frustration is that he’s put forward some reasonable proposals and reasonable discussions and he’s seen a level of unreasonableness [from Putin] that really frustrates him. It frustrates me as well,” Kellogg said in an interview with ABC News.
Trump, who made reaching a peace deal quickly one of the cornerstones of his foreign policy during last year’s election campaign, warned on May 28 he would determine within “about two weeks” whether Putin is serious about ending the fighting.
Moscow said on May 30 it was sending a team of negotiators to Istanbul on June 2 for a possible second round of direct talks with Ukraine, though Kyiv has yet to confirm whether it will attend.
Kellogg said in the ABC interview that US, German, French, and British officials will be in Istanbul on June 2 when a meeting may take place between Russian and Ukrainian delegations.
Russia has said it would use the meeting to present a “memorandum” outlining its terms for a peace settlement. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s top adviser has said Kyiv is ready to take part but wants to see Russia’s proposals for ending the war first.
Its delegation will be led by Vladimir Medinsky, a Russian political scientist and former culture minister who led Russia’s negotiating team on May 16 during the first round of direct talks.
