Missiles hit Kyiv overnight, wounding six, after US envoy meets Putin

Russian missiles struck Kyiv throughout the night into early Thursday, wounding six people and sending residents into air-raid shelters, Ukrainian authorities said, shortly after Moscow signalled it was ready in principle to resume trilateral talks with Ukraine and the United States.

Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko said on social media that missile strikes had wounded six people in the capital, four of whom needed hospital treatment. Ukraine’s air force issued warnings in the early hours of more ballistic missiles heading towards Kyiv and told residents to stay in shelters.

The overnight attacks came after US President Donald Trump’s envoy, Steve Witkoff, met Russian President Vladimir Putin in Saint Petersburg on Wednesday. Mr. Trump said after the meeting that it was “the closest we’ve been” to ending the war. Mr. Witkoff described the talks as “constructive” but said “there is still important work left to do”, adding that discussions would continue at the technical level between the US, Ukraine and Russia.

The Kremlin said Moscow was “in principle, ready to resume” trilateral talks in mid-November, after the US midterm elections, and wanted them to focus on post-war security. Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov told reporters that Mr. Witkoff had briefed Mr. Putin on “some new aspects in the approaches of the Europeans and Kyiv” from a meeting in Oslo, but said “there wasn’t really much substance in them”.

Mr. Witkoff had flown to Russia from Oslo, where he met Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Tuesday in an effort to ease a bitter rift between Mr. Trump and the Ukrainian leader. Mr. Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, also took part in the talks with Mr. Putin remotely.

During their three-hour meeting, Mr. Witkoff praised Mr. Putin for granting Mr. Trump’s request to free US citizen Stephen Hubbard, a retired English teacher in his 70s who had denied charges that he was a “mercenary” fighting for Ukraine. “You talk so much about my President, President Trump, being a humanitarian — you are a humanitarian also, sir, and I salute that,” Mr. Witkoff said.

Mr. Ushakov also said a summit between Mr. Putin, Mr. Trump and China’s Xi Jinping was being prepared in China’s Shenzhen for next month, calling it “the first such meeting in history”.

In Ukraine, Mr. Zelenskyy said Kyiv also backed resuming trilateral talks. “The American side is proposing to organize this meeting as soon as possible. We are in favour of it,” he told journalists.

Mr. Putin, who ordered the February 2022 invasion of Ukraine, has consistently rejected face-to-face talks with Mr. Zelenskyy and has insisted Moscow intends to seize the rest of east Ukraine.

Russian authorities said they had intercepted drones during the night, including more than 160 flying towards Moscow.

Mr. Trump returned to power in January 2025 promising to end the war in 24 hours, but more than a year of US-led talks has failed to produce a breakthrough, with tens of thousands killed. In recent days, Mr. Trump has again pivoted away from Ukraine and back to Mr. Putin, promoting what he said was a deal for Russia to sell diesel and reduce prices that he said had been sent soaring by the Iran war. He also delayed the imposition of sanctions on Russia’s war machine, a decision he defended on Wednesday as necessary to secure Mr. Hubbard’s release. “If you would’ve put those sanctions on... you could forget about him. You’d never see him again,” Mr. Trump told reporters at the White House.

The meeting was Mr. Witkoff’s ninth with Mr. Putin.