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Ukrainian authorities said Sunday that a drone strike ignited fires at one of Russia’s Black Sea ports ahead of this week’s fresh talks aimed at ending Moscow’s ongoing all-out war, now nearing its four-year mark.
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“An oil terminal in southern Russia and the Pantsir-S1 air defence systerm in the temporarily occupied territory of Crimea have been hit,” Ukraine’s General Staff said in a statement.
According to regional governor Veniamin Kondratyev, two people were wounded in the attack on the port of Taman in the Krasnodar region, which damaged an oil storage tank, warehouse and terminals.
In the latest Russian strikes, officials in Ukraine’s Odesa region reported falling debris from Moscow’s drones damaged civilian and transport infrastructure, causing disruption to the power and water supply, while two women were reportedly injured in a guided aerial bomb strike on the Zaporizhzhia District.
The latest attacks in fighting between both sides come ahead of another round of US-brokered talks between envoys from Russia and Ukraine on Tuesday and Wednesday in Geneva.
Ukrainian authorities say their long-range drone attacks against Russian energy facilities are intended to deny Moscow the money it needs from oil exports in order to carry out its full-scale invasion.
Their attacks are also seen as a response to Russia’s massive strikes to destroy the Ukrainian electricity grid in order to prevent citizens from having access to running water, heat, or light.
On Sunday, Ukrainian officials stated that over 1,600 buildings in Kyiv were still without heat following a series of Russian attacks on energy infrastructure, which have also killed dozens of civilians and workers.
Zelenskyy: Questions remain over security guarantees
Speaking at the Munich Security Conference in Germany on Saturday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy suggested there were still questions remaining over future security guarantees for his country.
His concerns were echoed by Senator Jeanne Shaheen, a ranking member of the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
“Unless we have real security guarantees on whatever peace agreement is ultimately determined, we are going to be here again, because one of the things we know is that Russia has geared up not just for Ukraine, but to go beyond Ukraine,” she told reporters in Munich on Sunday.
Zelenskyy also questioned how the concept of a free trade zone—proposed by the US—would work in Ukraine’s eastern Donbas region, which Russia insists Kyiv must give up for peace.
He said Washington wants peace as quickly as possible and that the US team wants to sign all the agreements on Ukraine at once, whereas Ukraine wants guarantees for the country’s future security signed first.
Meanwhile, EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas warned on Sunday that Russia was hoping to win diplomatically what it had failed to achieve on the battlefield and was banking on the US to deliver concessions at the negotiating table.
Kallas told the Munich conference that key Russian demands — including the lifting of sanctions and the unfreezing of assets — were for Europe to decide.
“If we want a sustainable peace then we need concessions also from the Russian side,” she said.
Previous US-led attempts to reach an agreement to end the war, including two rounds of negotiations in Abu Dhabi, have fallen short in resolving complex issues, including what to do with Ukraine’s industrial heartland of Donbas, parts of which are occupied by Russian forces.
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