Vladimir Putin kept it blunt. Sending troops to Ukraine, the Russian president told reporters at a BRICS summit in India, would mean war with his country. “Now they’re talking about how they’re considering sending troops into Ukraine,” he said. “That means a war with Russia.”
In the same breath he denied any hostile intent toward the continent: “We do not threaten, nor do we intend to threaten, European countries.”
Strikes continue across Ukraine
His words landed on a day of fresh bombardment. Russian drone and missile attacks on Saturday killed eight civilians and wounded dozens more, local officials said, with deaths reported in the Donetsk, Zhytomyr, Zaporizhzhia and Dnipropetrovsk regions. In Odesa, regional head Oleh Kiper described a “massive attack” that tore off the upper floors of a residential high-rise. Thirty-five people were hurt there.
Talks that go nowhere
The diplomatic signals pulled in opposite directions. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy told Deutsche Welle he would meet Putin at the Group of 20 summit planned for December in Miami, adding that practical results had to come first. The Kremlin shut that door quickly. Spokesman Dmitry Peskov told TASS a meeting at the summit was out of the question: “If he really wants to meet with Putin, Putin has already said that he could fly to Moscow.” Kyiv has refused again and again to go to the Russian capital.
Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said Russia stood “ready for negotiations” but would not pause military operations “during this period of negotiations.”
Pressure along the borders
Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk warned that Russia might stage provocations along Europe’s frontiers, after drone incidents near Ukraine’s crossings with Moldova and Poland. Moldova briefly closed parts of its airspace on Saturday when military radar picked up an unauthorized drone entering from Ukraine.
Ukraine hit back with drone strikes on two chemical plants, one in Russia’s Samara region and one in Perm, according to Zelenskyy. On the eastern front, Ukrainian military officials reported small gains along the Oskil River near Dvorichna, even as Russian forces kept targeting energy infrastructure ahead of winter.
