Ukraine-Russia war latest: Moscow warns European troops in Ukraine would be ‘targets’ as Trump meets Zelensky

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Moscow warned that any European troop contingents deployed to Ukraine would become legitimate targets for Russia’s armed forces, ahead of Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelensky’s crunch peace talks with his US counterpart today about security guarantees.

Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov went on to accuse European politicians of being driven by ambitions in their relations with Kyiv and disregarding the people of Ukraine and of their own nations, in the remarks published by Russia’s state news agency TASS.

Zelensky is set to discuss security guarantees and territorial disputes surrounding Donetsk and Zaporizhzhia with Donald Trump in the US leader’s Florida residence.

Putin warned that Moscow would accomplish all its goals by force if Ukraine didn’t want to resolve the conflict peacefully, according to TASS on Sunday, just one day after he launched a brutal aerial strike targeting Kyiv with almost 500 drones and 40 missiles. Nearly a third of Ukraine’s capital was left without heating in sub-zero weather conditions and two people were killed.

Zelensky has said the attack on Kyiv showed Putin “doesn’t want peace”, at a time where he confirmed a 20-point peace plan draft is “90 per cent ready.”