KYIV: Lead Ukrainian negotiator Rustem Umerov will meet with US envoy Steve Witkoff in Geneva on Thursday, Kyiv has announced, ahead of fresh trilateral talks with Russia expected in early March. The meetings are the latest round of negotiations spearheaded by US President Donald Trump that so far have failed to make meaningful progress on ending the Kremlin's four-year attack on Ukraine. "Tomorrow he will meet with American negotiators Witkoff and (Jared) Kushner," Ukrainian President Zelensky told a group of reporters. He added that the meeting was part of "preparations for a trilateral meeting with Russia, which we believe will take place in early March".
Umerov's adviser told reporters separately that the meeting on Thursday will be in Geneva, which hosted talks with Russian, Ukrainian, and US officials earlier this month. Other issues on the agenda for Thursday are prisoner-of-war exchanges and a "prosperity package" for the reconstruction of Ukraine, Zelensky said.
Witkoff confirmed the talks earlier this week saying the aim was to "explore different iterations about how we might get to a peace deal." United States has been pushing for an end to the war that has entered its fifth year and which has killed tens of thousands and destroyed much of eastern and southern Ukraine.
Moscow and Kyiv remain at odds over who gets what land in a post-war settlement. Russia is pushing for full control of Ukraine's eastern Donetsk region, and has threatened to take it by force if Kyiv does not cave at the negotiating table. But Ukraine has rejected the demand and signalled it would not sign a deal without security guarantees that deter Russia from attacking again.
Meanwhile, a Ukrainian drone attack on a fertiliser plant in Russia's western Smolensk region killed seven people and wounded 10 others, Russian officials said on Wednesday. The plant, just outside the Russian town of Dorogobuzh, lies around 290 kilometres (180 miles) from the Ukrainian border. Unverified images published on social media purported to show the plant in flames early on Wednesday, with columns of smoke billowing into the night sky. "The enemy struck PJSC Dorogobuzh, a civilian plant producing nitrogen fertiliser," Smolensk region governor Vasily Anokhin said in a post on Telegram.
Russia's Investigative Committee, which probes major crimes, said later seven people were killed, updating a previous toll, in what would be one of the deadliest attacks on a Russian industrial site of the four-year war. Ukraine fired "at least 30 drones equipped with explosive devices," causing "significant damage" it said in a statement. Rescuers had on Wednesday morning contained the fires, while authorities were considering evacuating residents from the neighbouring village for their safety, governor Anokhin added. The plant was also attacked in December last year, according to Russian media reports.
Ukraine, which denies targeting civilians, did not immediately comment. Ukraine has fired thousands of drones over the Russian border since Moscow launched its Ukraine offensive in 2022, some of which have landed hundreds of kilometres from the front line. The strikes often target Russia's oil and gas industry and other industrial sites and have caused billions of dollars of damage. Kyiv says the attacks are fair retaliation for Russian strikes on its own civilians that have killed hundreds and crippled Ukrainian energy infrastructure. — AFP
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