People take shelter at a metro station during Russian air attacks in Kyiv on December 27, 2025, amid the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Ukraine’s air force announced a countrywide air alert and said drones and missiles were moving over several regions including Kyiv. (Photo by Serhii Okunev / AFP via Getty Images)
Serhii Okunev | Afp | Getty Images
Heavy Russian shelling and explosions struck Kyiv and the surrounding region early Saturday morning, killing at least two people and injuring 20 more on a weekend set for high-level diplomatic talks and a renewed push for peace.
The attacks came just hours before European leaders were set to speak by phone with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy as part of a growing push for a peace deal that will see the Ukrainian president hold talks with President Donald Trump in the U.S. on Sunday.
The overnight strikes killed one person and injured 20 more in Kyiv, Ukrainian Minister of Interior Ihor Klymenko said, adding that more than 10 residential buildings in the city had been damaged.
One person was also killed in the city of Bila Tserkva, around 55 miles south of Kyiv, he added.
The strikes caused the temporary closure of two airports in southeastern Poland after the Polish air force scrambled fighter jets, the Polish Air Navigation Services Agency said on X.
Zelenskyy said Saturday that 500 Russian drones and 40 missiles had struck the nation, showing that Russian President Vladimir Putin does “not want to end the war.”
“If Russia turns even the Christmas and New Year period into a time of destroyed homes and burned apartments, of ruined power plants, then this sick activity can only be responded to with truly strong steps,” he posted on X. “The United States has this capability. Europe has this capability.”
The latest strikes came less than 48 hours after Zelenskyy signaled that a peace deal was close, and just a day before talks with Trump in Florida on Sunday.
A Ukrainian official familiar with the planning for Sunday’s meeting told NBC News that, in addition to security guarantees for Ukraine, the Ukrainians are preparing to discuss economic prosperity and reconstruction of the war-torn country.
There are also talks of holding a joint news conference with Trump and Zelenskyy, not necessarily to announce anything new, but to discuss the results of the meeting, the Ukrainian official said.
In a WhatsApp chat with Ukrainian journalists on Friday, Zelenskyy said, “The 20-point plan we have been working on is 90% ready,” and that negotiating teams in Ukraine and the U.S. had made “significant progress.”
“Our task is to make sure everything is 100% ready,” he added. “This is not easy, and no one says that 100% will happen immediately. But still, with each such meeting and each such conversation, we must bring the desired result closer.”
Ahead of those talks, Zelenskyy will speak with European leaders and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen on Saturday, a European Commission spokesperson told NBC News.
The agenda for the talks remains unclear, as does which leaders will be in attendance. European leaders have been largely sidelined in the main negotiations between the U.S., Ukraine and Russia.
European leaders have focused on how to support Ukraine in the event of a peace deal, with talks ongoing over security guarantees and funding. But longtime American allies in Europe have struggled to balance mounting pressure from Washington with their reluctance to give in to Russia’s hard-line demands.
Trump has made a high-level diplomatic push to end the war, but his efforts have run into Moscow’s and Kyiv’s widely differing positions and demands.
Putin, who launched a full-scale invasion of Russia’s much smaller neighbor in February 2022, has not backed off maximalist demands that would see Ukraine blocked from integrating with the West and limit its ability to defend itself. Until Tuesday, Zelenskyy had maintained that he would be unwilling to withdraw troops from the country’s eastern industrial heartland, much of which has been occupied by Russian forces, as part of a plan to end the war.
The Ukrainian leader has since given details of an updated peace plan offering Russia the potential withdrawal of Ukrainian troops from the east and the creation of a demilitarized zone in their place.
Trump told Politico Friday that he anticipated a “good” meeting with the Ukrainian leader, though he offered no endorsement of Zelenskyy’s plan.
Zelenskyy “doesn’t have anything until I approve it,” he said. “So we’ll see what he’s got.”