(Adnkronos) – While Russia appears close to conquering Pokrovsk, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has expressed his willingness to meet with US Secretary of State Marco Rubio to discuss the war in Ukraine. But he insisted that Moscow’s interests must be taken into account when discussing the “Ukraine issue.”
“It is important to discuss the Ukrainian issue and promote the bilateral agenda,” Lavrov said. “Therefore we communicate by telephone and are ready to hold face-to-face meetings if necessary,” he added.
In the interview, Lavrov said he believed that talks Putin and US President Donald Trump held in Alaska in the summer should remain the basis of a potential agreement to end aggression against Ukraine. “At that time, the Americans assured us that they could guarantee that Volodymyr Zelenskyy would not obstruct the peace process. Apparently, there were some difficulties that arose in this regard,” he said.
“The European Commission’s cynical interpretation of the UN Charter and other international legal norms, including provisions regarding sovereign immunity and the inviolability of central bank assets, has long ceased to be surprising. Such actions amount to fraud and robbery,” the Russian Foreign Minister further said, responding to a question about the possible use of frozen Russian assets to support Kiev. “No matter how the plan to extort money from Russia is organized, there is no legal way to do it and Russia will respond appropriately.”
Meanwhile, a new hail of drones and missiles occurred in Ukraine. According to Ukrainian authorities, Russia has seized additional territory around the cities of Pokrovsk and Kupiansk and occupied the village of Volchye in eastern Ukraine.
The Ukrainian Defense Forces and Russian units were involved in 196 clashes in the last 24 hours, with the Pokrovsk sector recording the most intense activity, with the Ukrainian side claiming to have repelled 73 enemy attacks, according to the latest information provided by the General Staff of the Ukrainian Armed Forces. The alarm was raised for Chernihiv region, Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk and Nizhyn districts. Drones were also reported in the Sumy region, Konotop and Shostka districts.
According to CNN, Russian troops appear to be on the verge of conquering Pokrovsk, in eastern Ukraine, a symbolic victory that President Vladimir Putin has been working towards for 21 months with increasing sacrifice. Fighting inside the city has intensified in recent days after Russian troops managed to infiltrate. The fall of Pokrovsk – whose strategic value has been significantly reduced, but is still the biggest victory for Moscow since 2023 – now seems almost inevitable, according to reports from those on the ground.
Although Kiev denied Russian claims that Ukrainian troops in Pokrovsk were surrounded, and said on Wednesday that active operations were still underway to stop the Russian advance, Ukrainian soldiers on the ground painted an increasingly dramatic picture of the reality.
Kiev acknowledged that the situation in Pokrovsk was difficult, but said fighting continued.
Moscow authorities reported overnight drone attacks on the CHPP-1 thermoelectric power plant, which supplies heat energy to four districts of the Russian city of Voronezh, about 250 kilometers from the border with Ukraine: Livoberezhni, Zaliznichni, Leninski and Tsentralni, as well as a thousand companies, including the city’s largest plant, the Voronezhsintezkauchuk petrochemical plant.
The attack caused a fire at the facility, which was quickly extinguished, as well as power and heating outages, as confirmed by the region’s governor, Alexander Gusev. Gusev also reported that several drones were intercepted by Russian air defense systems.
