Russia strikes Kyiv SBU HQ as US envoys head to Moscow — SkimNews
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- Russia struck Ukraine's SBU headquarters in central Kyiv with a Friday drone that Zelenskyy said was deliberately targeted, wounding nine people near St. Sophia Cathedral and international hotels
- Zelenskyy instructed acting security chief Oleksandr Poklad to "respond appropriately, significantly, and, if possible, in kind" to the strike on the SBU building
- US envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner will travel to Moscow first and then Kyiv over the weekend into early next week for renewed peace negotiations, per a US official
- Ukraine's Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha called the strike a "major escalation" that came as peace talks were building momentum, accusing Moscow of laying bare its "true rejection of diplomacy"
- Russian forces carried out a massive overnight attack on the Odesa region killing one and injuring at least five including a child, killed two police officers in Dnipro, and wounded three in a Kyiv residential strike
- Ukraine struck oil depots in the Black Sea resort city of Sochi and nearby Sirius district, sparking blazes as part of its escalating campaign against Russian energy infrastructure
- Finnish authorities are investigating how a Russian-made Geoscan 701 drone ended up on a rocky shoreline in the Pellinge archipelago east of Helsinki after being discovered Tuesday by a fisherman
Why it matters: The strike on Kyiv's SBU headquarters — an agency running deep strikes into Russia — escalates the air war as US envoys Witkoff and Kushner prepare Moscow-Kyiv visits. Putin previously called negotiations "frozen" and the White House's attention has shifted to Iran, yet Ukraine confirms readiness for substantive talks.
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