By Frank Jack Daniel and Angelo Amante
KYIV/ROME (Reuters) -Hundreds of Russian drones and more than a dozen missiles targeted Kyiv and other Ukrainian regions in a second massive air attack in two days early on Thursday ahead of what the U.S. and Russia said were “frank” talks between them on ending the war.
U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio, after speaking with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov during an ASEAN meeting in Kuala Lumpur, said he had reinforced President Donald Trump’s message that Moscow should have shown more flexibility.
“We need to see a roadmap moving forward about how this conflict can conclude,” Rubio said, adding that the Trump administration had been engaging with the U.S. Senate on what new sanctions on Russia might look like.
“It was a frank conversation. It was an important one,” Rubio said after the 50-minute talks.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, who met allies in Rome to lobby for critical weapons and investment, said Thursday’s assault had involved around 400 drones and 18 missiles, primarily targeting the capital.
Two people were killed, 23 were wounded and damage reported in nearly every district of Kyiv.
Explosions and anti-aircraft machine gun fire rattled the city. Windows were blown out, facades ravaged and cars burned to shells, including in the city centre where an apartment in an eight-storey building was engulfed in flames.
“This is terror because it happens every night when people are asleep,” said Karyna Volf, a 25-year-old Kyiv resident who rushed out of her apartment moments before shards of glass showered her home.
Ukrainian air defences stopped all but a few dozen of the drones, authorities said, a day after Russia launched a record 728 drones at Ukraine.
Escalating Russian strikes in recent weeks have strained Ukraine’s air defences at a time when its troops are facing renewed pressure on the front line, and forced residents in Kyiv and across the country to seek cover in bomb shelters.
“Residential buildings, vehicles, warehouse facilities, offices and non-residential buildings are on fire,” said Tymur Tkachenko, head of Kyiv’s military administration, on the Telegram messaging app.
Russia’s Defence Ministry said it had hit “military-industrial” targets in Kyiv as well as military airfields.
ROME CONFERENCE
Zelenskiy urged European allies to “much more actively” use Russian assets frozen during the war for Ukrainian reconstruction and was also seeking critical weapons, joint defence production and investment at the conference in Rome.
Conference participants pledged over 10 billion euros ($11.7 billion) to help rebuild Ukraine, said Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni. The European Commission announced 2.3 billion euros ($2.7 billion) in support.
The commitments come after Washington resumed deliveries to Ukraine of artillery shells and precision artillery missiles, according to two U.S. officials, following Trump’s pledge this week to send more defensive arms to Kyiv.
Trump has also signalled willingness to send more Patriot air-defence missiles that have proven critical to defending against fast-moving Russian ballistic missiles.
Zelenskiy, who said he had a “substantive” talk with U.S. envoy Keith Kellogg on Wednesday, will also meet American officials to discuss potential new U.S. sanctions on Russia, Ukraine’s foreign minister said.
Trump has been growing increasingly frustrated with President Vladimir Putin, saying that the Russian leader was throwing a lot of “bullshit” at the U.S. efforts to end the war that Moscow launched against Ukraine in February 2022.
Speaking in Rome, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz urged Trump to “stay with us” in backing Ukraine and Europe. He also said Germany is prepared to buy Patriot air defence systems from the United States and provide them to Ukraine.
Reporting on the talks between Rubio and Lavrov, which also covered Iran and Syria, Moscow’s foreign ministry said they had shared “a substantive and frank exchange of views”.
(Additional reporting by Gleb Garanich, Lidia Kelly, Yurii Kovalenko and Anastasiia Malenko; Writing by Dan PeleschukEditing by Gareth Jones and Philippa Fletcher)
