Dec. 30 (UPI) — Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky accused Russia of lying over a large-scale drone attack on President Vladimir Putin’s state residence 300 miles northwest of Moscow, which it claims was carried out by Kyiv.
Monday’s alleged attack shortly after high-level U.S.-Ukraine talks at Mar-a-Lago ended was an excuse to attack Ukraine, most likely Kyiv and government buildings there, and keep the war going, Zelensky told reporters.
Zelensky said it was no accident that Moscow announced the attack after he and U.S. President Donald Trump said they had made good progress toward finalizing a peace agreement framework, as well as lengthy security guarantees, in talks Sunday at Trump’s resort in Palm Beach.
“It’s obvious that yesterday we had a meeting with President Trump, and it’s clear that when there is no scandal for the Russians, when there is progress, it is a failure for them. They do not want to end this war and are only capable of doing so under pressure. So they are looking for a pretext,” said Zelensky.
“Russia is at it again, using dangerous statements to undermine all achievements of our shared diplomatic efforts with President Trump’s team. We keep working together to bring peace closer. This alleged ‘residence strike’ story is a complete fabrication intended to justify additional attacks against Ukraine, including Kyiv, as well as Russia’s own refusal to take necessary steps to end the war. Typical Russian lies,” Zelensky wrote on X.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said Monday that Moscow had already decided on when and which targets it would hit in retaliation for Kyiv’s targeting of Putin’s residence in the Novgorod region with 91 drones, which he described as a terrorist attack.
All the drones were downed by air defenses or electronic means and neither Putin or anyone else was hurt in the incident, according to Lavrov.
However, he warned Russia would revise its stance on the peace negotiations accordingly, “taking into account the Kyiv regime’s final transition to a policy of state terrorism,” but said Moscow would not be sharing details of its new tougher policy.
Speaking at a briefing on Tuesday, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov ruled out Moscow pulling the plug on the peace talks.
“Russia is not withdrawing from the negotiation process, and will certainly continue talks and dialogue, primarily with the Americans,” he said.
Speaking to journalists at Mar-a-Lago on Monday night, Trump said he was very angry about the attack, which he said he learned about directly from Putin, saying it was not the right time for offense when peace negotiations were in such a “delicate phase.”
“I don’t like it. It’s not good. I learned about it from President Putin today. I was very angry about it. It’s a delicate period of time. This is not the right time. It’s one thing to be offensive, because they’re offensive. It’s another thing to attack his house. It’s not the right time to do any of that.”
However, he acknowledged the attack may never have taken place and vowed that U.S. intelligence would get to the bottom of it.
According to the Kremlin, the attack in the early hours of Monday local time came “almost immediately” after the American and Ukrainian teams’ talks ended on Sunday evening.
Zelensky and Trump emerged from the talks to say they were at least 95% agreed on extendable 15-year security guarantees for Ukraine, but that the issues of territory and the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant remained sticking points.