The administration appears inclined to adopt Russia’s wholly fictionalized version of the facts of this war.

Donald Trump has blamed Volodymyr Zelensky for starting the war with Russia – a day after a massive Russian attack killed 35 people and injured 117 others in Ukraine.

The US president said the Ukrainian leader shared the blame with Russian President Vladimir Putin for "millions of people dead" in the Ukraine war.

"You don't start a war against someone 20 times your size and then hope that people give you some missiles," he told reporters at the White House, also blaming former US President Joe Biden for the conflict.

On Friday Steve Witkoff travelled to St Petersburg to hold talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin. Friday’s meeting was the third time this year that President Donald Trump’s special envoy met with the Russian President. The meeting, which lasted for more than four hours, focused on ‘aspects of a Ukrainian settlement’. Witkoff’s visit came after President Trump warned the Kremlin on social media that it ‘has to get moving’ on a ceasefire.

• Ballistic missiles hit centre of city in Ukraine's north not far from Russian border, Kyiv officials say
• Some 117 people injured, bodies strewn about street
• Ukraine says Russia used cluster munitions, deliberately hit civilians
• Moscow yet to comment on deadliest strike since September 2024
• Attack comes soon after Trump envoy held talks with Putin in US push to end war

China denied any military involvement in Ukraine, after Kyiv said it had captured two Chinese men in the country’s east.

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Lin Jian on Wednesday said China was still trying to confirm with Ukraine details of the capture of the two Chinese citizens who Ukrainian authorities said were fighting for the Russian military.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said two Chinese nationals fighting in the Russian army have been taken prisoner in eastern Ukraine.

Zelensky said Tuesday that Ukrainian forces fighting in the Donetsk region obtained the Chinese nationals’ documents, bank cards and personal data.

resident Donald Trump continues to advocate for a ceasefire between Russia and Ukraine as the conflict enters its third year. The United States recently helped broker a partial ceasefire, focusing on safer navigation in the Black Sea for shipments and halting long-range strikes on energy sites. However, disagreements persist over the ceasefire's timing and scope. Reports from various outlets say Trump is frustrated with both Presidents Putin and Zelenskyy.

US President Donald Trump accused the Ukrainian president of “trying to back out” of the minerals deal expected to be agreed between the two countries as early as this week, adding that Volodymyr Zelensky would face “big problems” if he didn’t sign an agreement. But Ukraine has highlighted that the conditions of the deal changed significantly in recent days.

On a spring morning two months after Vladimir Putin’s invading armies marched into Ukraine, a convoy of unmarked cars slid up to a Kyiv street corner and collected two middle-aged men in civilian clothes.

Leaving the city, the convoy — manned by British commandos, out of uniform but heavily armed — traveled 400 miles west to the Polish border. The crossing was seamless, on diplomatic passports. Farther on, they came to the Rzeszów-Jasionka Airport, where an idling C-130 cargo plane waited.

There was "anger," "surprise," and "panic" among the administration of former U.S. President Joe Biden after Ukraine sunk the Mosvka, the flagship of Russia's Black Sea Fleet, a report published by the New York Times on March 29 suggests.

The Moskva sank on April 14, 2022, after being struck by two Ukrainian R-360 Neptune anti-ship missiles. The attack marked one of Kyiv’s most significant early victories in the full-scale war and dealt a major blow to Russia’s Black Sea fleet.