Ukraine-Russia war latest: Zelensky arrives in Paris for Macron talks as Putin blames UK for factory strike

The Kremlin said on Wednesday it was clear that British specialists were involved in a deadly Ukrainian strike on the Russian city of Bryansk using Storm Shadow missiles.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov added that Russia’s “special military operation” would continue to prevent what he called such “barbaric” attacks.

A Ukrainian strike on Tuesday using Storm Shadow missiles on Bryansk killed at least seven people and injured 37 more.

Ukraine has not denied carrying out the attack, saying it struck a key factory producing components for Russian missiles, and therefore a legitimate military target.

Russia’s energy giant Gazprom said that two of its gas pumping stations, Russkaya and Beregovaya, were targeted by air strikes overnight but the attacks were foiled.

The Russian defence ministry said earlier that Ukrainian drones had attempted to attack the Russkaya station overnight.

The stations are part of a network that sends gas via the TurkStream and Blue Stream pipelines to Europe.

The EU has threatened to withdraw funding from the Venice Biennale if organisers go ahead with plans to allow Russia to reopen its pavilion at this year’s edition.

Russia’s pavilion at the art fair was closed after Moscow’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, which led to Russian artists and institutions being excluded from major European cultural events.

“Member states, institutions and organisations must act in line with EU sanctions and avoid giving a platform to individuals who have actively supported or justified the Kremlin’s aggression against Ukraine,” an EU statement said.

It added that the Commission would examine further action, “including the suspension or termination of an ongoing EU grant to the Biennale Foundation”, which organises the contemporary visual arts event that runs from May to December in Venice’s historic shipyards, known as the Arsenale.

Biennale president Pietrangelo Buttafuoco described the festival as “a space of coexistence for the whole planet” without censorship that should remain open even to countries in conflict.

However, Italy’s culture minister Alessandro Giuli said the government disagreed with the Biennale Foundation’s “entirely autonomous” decision.

Prime minister Giorgia Meloni has been a staunch supporter of EU sanctions against Russia, although before the invasion the co-ruling League party had close ties with Vladimir Putin’s United Russia party.

Ukraine’s foreign minister Andrii Sybiha and deputy prime minister Tetyana Berezhna urged the international art community to remain vigilant over Russia’s use of culture as a tool of propaganda.

“The Venice Biennale is one of the world’s most authoritative art platforms, and it must not become a stage for whitewashing the war crimes that Russia commits daily against the Ukrainian people and our cultural heritage,” they said.

Now, with Iranian drones having killed multiple US troops, American officials consider ignoring the initial outreach a major misstep.

“If there’s a tactical error or a mistake we made leading up to this [war in Iran], this was it,” a US official told Axios.

Last August, Ukrainian officials reportedly tried to sell the U.S. battle-proven technology to take on Iran’s low-cost, unnamed, one-way Shahed attack drones, which Russia has made a major part of its arsenal for the war in Ukraine.

Ukrainian defence technology company DevDroid’s Droid TW-7.62 robotic platform was used by soldiers from the Disney Squad unit during an engagement in which Russian infantry attempted to advance on Ukrainian defensive positions.

According to DevDroid, the system first detected two Russian drones positioned near a road leading to the Ukrainian position. Described as “waiting drones”, they were destroyed before the robot opened fire on approaching infantry.

The company said the system then identified two Russian soldiers moving towards Ukrainian lines. One was killed by machine-gun fire and the other was wounded during the exchange.

Russian forces subsequently shelled the area with artillery in what appeared to be an attempt to destroy the robotic platform.However, DevDroid said the system remained operational and fired at another group of Russian troops advancing towards the position, forcing them to withdraw and allowing Ukrainian forces to hold their ground.

The Droid TW-7.62 is a reconnaissance and strike unmanned ground system designed to carry a KT-7.62 machine gun. The platform includes a ballistic computer intended to improve accuracy and incorporates elements of artificial intelligence capable of detecting, tracking and engaging targets.

The most recent concession to Vladimir Putin came after the first telephone call between the two presidents this year – one that the Kremlin says was initiated by the Oval Office to the Russian president.

With an eye on the oil markets, Trump said that he thought the war against Iran would end soon, adding it was “very complete”, before declaring hours later that the fight would continue as we “haven’t won enough”.

His “secretary of war”, Pete Hegseth, then had a go at clearing things up, promising that Tuesday would see the heaviest strikes by the US and Israel so far and warned that Iran would suffer catastrophic consequences if it throttled Gulf oil exports.

Hungarian foreign minister Peter Szijjarto has accused Volodymyr Zelensky of lying after the Ukrainian president said he did not know what a Hungarian delegation was doing in Ukraine.

Hungary’s foreign minister said on Facebook that Kyiv had been officially informed about the visit in advance.

“Zelensky claims he did not know about the arrival of the Hungarian delegation in Ukraine because the Hungarian government did not coordinate the visit with Ukraine’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs. But what is the reality? Yesterday we officially informed the Ukrainians that a Hungarian delegation led by Deputy Energy Minister Gabor Czepek would visit Ukraine to inspect the condition of the Druzhba oil pipeline, and we also requested a meeting with Ukraine’s energy minister,” Szijjarto said.

He also shared a document dated 10 March showing a request from the Hungarian embassy in Kyiv to Ukraine’s foreign ministry stating that the delegation would be in the capital on Thursday and Friday. The embassy asked Ukrainian authorities to help arrange a meeting between the delegation and Denys Shmyhal, Ukraine’s first deputy prime minister and energy minister.

He further accused Ukraine of blocking oil supplies to Hungary at a time when maritime oil transport faces major uncertainty, arguing that the only alternative to the Druzhba pipeline is sea routes.“Therefore, the Ukrainian oil blockade is nothing less than a grave crime against Hungary,” he said.

Earlier, Zelensky said that as far as his administration was concerned, the Hungarian officials were visiting in a “private” capacity.

In an interview with Politico, Volodymyr Zelensky said Donald Trump needs to put “more pressure on Russia, not on me.”

“We need negotiations. We support them,” he told the outlet. “We don’t trust Russia, but I think, and I trust that Americans really want to finish with this war. I hope that they will help us, but we need more pressure on Russia, not on me.”

The comments come a week after Trump expressed renewed frustration with Zelensky, saying Ukraine’s leader needed to “get on the ball” and strike a deal, and suggesting he believed Vladimir Putin was more ready to negotiate a truce.

Zelensky said talks with Trump’s envoys in December suggested the US could offer some form of security guarantee for Ukraine as part of a peace deal, but details remain unclear.

“President Trump told me, ‘Do you trust that our security guarantees can be stronger than Nato?’ I said, ‘Yes, it depends on you for today. It depends on you, Mr president. God bless if we will have stronger security guarantees than NATO. But what will be after you? And what will be after me?’” Zelensky said.

A senior envoy for Donald Trump said he had met a Russian delegation led by an aide to Vladimir Putin, in a rare high-level contact between officials from the two countries as diplomatic efforts to address the war in Ukraine continue.

Steve Witkoff, Trump’s special envoy, said last night that the meeting took place in Florida with a Russian delegation headed by Kirill Dmitriev, who serves as Putin’s envoy.

Posting on X, Witkoff said the Russian delegation met a US team that included himself, Jared Kushner and White House senior adviser Josh Gruenbaum.

“Today in Florida, the Russian delegation led by Special Envoy Kirill Dmitriev met with the US delegation, including Special Envoy Steve Witkoff, Jared Kushner, and White House Senior Advisor Josh Gruenbaum,” Witkoff wrote.

He did not provide details about the discussions, limiting his statement to a brief summary.

“The teams discussed a variety of topics and agreed to stay in touch,” he added.

The meeting comes as Washington signals growing interest in reviving diplomatic channels related to Russia’s war against Ukraine.

Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky has arrived in Paris today to meet French president Emmanuel Macron, sources at the French president’s office said.

“The two leaders will discuss the current situation, the support of France and European partners to help Ukraine defend itself, and ways to increase pressure on Russia, particularly by targeting its shadow fleet,” the source told Reuters on Thursday.