Russia accused Ukraine of targeting Vladimir Putin's residence with drones, prompting a revision of peace negotiations. Photo / Getty Images
Russia will revise its position on peace negotiations after it accused Ukraine of targeting Vladimir Putin’s official residence in an overnight drone strike.
Sergei Lavrov, the Russian foreign minister, said that Moscow had downed 91 long-range drones over Putin’s Valdai residence in Novgorod.
Within minutes, Volodymyr Zelenskyy dismissed the claims as “another round of lies”, warning that Russia was laying the groundwork for a strike on Kyiv’s government buildings.
Zelenskyy said in a statement on social media site X: “This alleged ‘residence strike’ story is a complete fabrication intended to justify additional attacks against Ukraine, including Kyiv, as well as Russia’s own refusal to take necessary steps to end the war.”
Lavrov said the Kremlin’s position in negotiations to end the war in Ukraine would “be revised” as a result of the attack, accusing Kyiv of state terrorism and claiming that Moscow has no intention of withdrawing from talks.
He told Russian state media: “Such reckless actions will not go unanswered.”
Putin had raised the alleged attack in a phone call with Donald Trump, leaving the US President “shocked”, according to Yuri Ushakov, the Kremlin spokesman.
Alexander Grushko, Russia’s deputy minister of foreign affairs, even claimed Britain was involved in the alleged attack to disrupt the peace process.
It was not clear whether Putin was at the residence at the time of the alleged strike. Reports have stated that the Russian President has increasingly favoured Valdai since the start of the full-scale invasion in February 2022.
The countryside property is located on a peninsula between two lakes, making it difficult to target with drones and missiles, and is thought to be heavily guarded.
Satellite imagery from 2024 showed 12 heavy-duty Pantsir-S1 air defence systems installed around Lake Valdai as Kyiv stepped up its attacks on Russian soil.
The accusation has threatened to derail delicate peace negotiations just hours after Donald Trump hosted Zelenskyy at his Mar-a-Lago residence at the weekend. The US President claimed a deal was “closer than ever before”.
After the talks, Zelenskyy revealed that he asked Trump to provide Ukraine with security guarantees lasting half a century. The Ukrainian President said that a draft peace plan devised by officials from Kyiv and Washington had laid out 15 years of security guarantees, but that he wanted more.
He said to journalists after his meeting with Trump in Florida: “I told [Mr Trump] that the war is still going on, and it has been going on for almost 15 years ... I told him that we would very much like to consider the possibility of 30, 40, 50 years.”
He added that Trump had replied that he would think about the request.
Kyiv has been pushing for “article 5-style” security guarantees from Europe and the US, referring to the mutual defence clause of Nato’s founding treaty. Ukraine had aspirations to become a member of Nato but Russian opposition has ruled that out.
However, the nature of the security guarantees in the agreement being considered has not been fully divulged.
Trump said that US security guarantees were “95%” decided but added that European countries would “take over a big part” of the effort to ensure Ukraine’s security in the event of a peace deal.
At least 26 members of the so-called coalition of the willing have agreed to deploy troops or equipment to post-war Ukraine as part of a reassurance force.
But Lavrov said that Moscow would perceive them as “legitimate targets for our armed forces” and accused Europe of “preparing for war with Russia”.
Security guarantees were just one of the “thorny issues” that Trump faced in telephone talks with Putin and in-person negotiations with Zelenskyy, in which the US President insisted: “Russia wants to see Ukraine succeed.”
The largest stumbling block is the fate of Ukraine’s eastern Donbas region. The Kremlin claimed that Trump and Putin had agreed Kyiv needed to make a decision on that matter “without delay”.
Although Zelenskyy appears to have signalled a slightly softened line on territorial concessions from Ukraine in Donbas – a significant compromise – he has maintained that a ceasefire is needed to stage a referendum on the final deal.
Ukraine’s constitution requires a nationwide referendum to approve any changes to the country’s 1991 border. Kyiv has said it is ready to hold a vote under martial law, but Zelenskyy said that Ukraine would need a ceasefire of “at least 60 days” to hold the ballot in safe conditions and without interference.
Ushakov claimed that during Putin’s telephone call with the US President both leaders had ruled out a temporary ceasefire in Ukraine to hold a referendum, saying it would “only prolong the conflict”.
Dmitry Peskov, the Kremlin spokesman, told reporters in Moscow that Russia was seeking the “withdrawal of [Kyiv’s] armed forces from Donbas beyond the administrative borders”.
The Kremlin has long insisted that Ukraine pull out of close to a quarter of its own territory in the eastern Donetsk region to secure a peace deal.
Trump said that a proposal to turn the parts of Donbas that Ukraine still controls into a demilitarised “free economic zone”, which would see Kyiv withdrawing its troops, was still “unresolved”.
The Ukrainian president said last week that he opposed the plan, but “either the war continues, or something will have to be decided regarding all potential economic zones”.
The Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant, Europe’s largest, which Russia seized in March 2022, is also a major sticking point in the negotiations. Russia wants to restart the vast six-reactor site to integrate it into its own grid, which has significant deficits in some areas.
The US has proposed trilateral co-operation for the plant under its own oversight, while Russia envisions joint Russian-US use of the facility, cutting Ukraine out.
Trump praised Putin for “working with Ukraine on getting it open”, adding: “He hasn’t hit it with missiles.”
Peskov told reporters in Moscow that Putin would have another phone call with the US President “very soon” to continue discussing the plan.
Meanwhile, Zelenskyy said that Washington had agreed to host European leaders again at some point in January, either at the White House or “some place”.
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