US proposes trilateral meeting with Ukraine, Russia in UAE, Zelenskiy says

The United States has proposed that the United Arab Emirates host a trilateral meeting with Ukraine and Russia to discuss efforts to end their four-and-a-half-year war, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Friday.
“The American side has proposed... meeting at a technical level in a three-way format,” Zelenskiy told reporters in a briefing via WhatsApp.
“We are awaiting a proposal from the United States regarding the date, and the United States has suggested the Emirates as a possible location.”
Zelenskiy held talks this week with US President Donald Trump on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly in New York, where they discussed ways to bring an end to the war, launched by Russia’s February 2022 full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
After his talks with Trump, Zelenskiy said, Ukrainian negotiators met with their US counterparts to discuss specific details.
“We will inform and discuss these details with the European side, the Americans will talk to the Russians, and we will return in 10 days with either a new perspective or a result,” Zelenskiy said.
The Kremlin said on Friday that a trilateral meeting with Ukraine and the US could happen soon.
The Ukrainian leader said he had asked Trump to raise the Ukraine war during his talks with Chinese President Xi Jinping, who is on a state visit to the US.
Zelenskiy said he was still awaiting feedback from the US team, particularly regarding efforts to de-escalate the conflict ahead of winter.
He warned European partners, meanwhile, that Russia would continue its hybrid attacks against them, and said that Ukraine had offered its assistance to them. The Kremlin has denied being behind acts of sabotage in European countries in recent months.
Meanwhile, Ukraine killed two people in overnight drone attacks on Russia and struck an oil refinery and a passenger train, Russian officials said.
Russia’s Defence Ministry said air defence units had destroyed a total of 592 drones overnight.
One civilian was killed and another wounded when a Ukrainian drone struck a truck in Russia’s Belgorod region, local officials said. In the Perm region - which hosts a major oil refinery - Governor Dmitry Makhonin said one man had been killed during a massive drone attack.
Separately, Yuri Slyusar, the governor of the southern Rostov region, said about 50 drones had been destroyed over his region overnight and that a drone attack had damaged the Novoshakhtinsk oil refinery, forcing it to suspend operations temporarily. He said there were no reports of casualties.
Eight people had also been injured in a drone attack on the Ulyanovsk region, Governor Alexei Russkikh said. Russkikh said industrial and civilian infrastructure had been damaged in the attack on the region, which hosts a major electronics plant. A daytime Russian drone strike on Kyiv on Friday killed three people and left seven wounded, the Ukrainian capital’s mayor said.
“According to preliminary information, in the parking lot near the office building where the UAV struck, cars are on fire and the bodies of three people killed have been found. Seven people were wounded,” Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko said on Telegram.