Zaporizhzhia<\/a> Nuclear Power Plant in southeastern Ukraine and warned they could trigger a nuclear accident. The nuclear plant \u2013 Europe\u2019s biggest \u2013 is under Russian control.<\/p>\nIn western Russia\u2019s Leningrad region, firefighters responded to a blaze at the port of Ust-Luga, home to a major fuel export terminal. The regional governor said about 10 Ukrainian drones were shot down and the debris ignited the fire.<\/p>\n
Russia\u2019s Ministry of Defence said its air defences intercepted a total of 95 Ukrainian drones over Russian territory overnight into Sunday.<\/p>\n
Russia fired 72 drones and decoys along with a cruise missile into Ukraine in the same time period, Ukraine\u2019s air force said. Of these, 48 drones were shot down or jammed, it said.<\/p>\n
Ukraine\u2019s Independence Day<\/p>\n
The incidents occurred as Ukraine marked its Independence
Day, commemorating its 1991 declaration of independence from the Soviet Union. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy delivered remarks in a video address from Kyiv\u2019s Independence Square, emphasising the nation\u2019s resolve.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are building a Ukraine that will have enough strength and power to live in security and peace,\u201d Zelenskyy said while calling for a \u201cjust peace\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat our future will be is up to us alone,\u201d he said in a nod to the United States-Russia summit in Alaska this month, which many feared would leave Ukrainian and European interests sidelined.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe world knows this. And the world respects this. It respects Ukraine. It perceives Ukraine as an equal,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov slammed Zelenskyy for \u201cobstinately insisting, setting conditions, demanding an immediate meeting at all costs\u201d with Russian President Vladimir Putin.<\/p>\n
Lavrov also accused Ukrainian authorities of \u201cattempts to disrupt the process that was laid down by Presidents Putin and [Donald] Trump [of the US], which has yielded very good results\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe hope that these attempts will be thwarted,\u201d he said, accusing Western countries of trying to \u201cblock\u201d peace negotiations to end the Ukraine conflict after a flurry of diplomatic activity appeared to stall.<\/p>\n
On Friday, Lavrov said \u201cno meeting\u201d between Zelenskyy and Putin was planned. The Trump administration has been making efforts to organise a meeting between Zelenskyy and Putin to find a solution to the war.<\/p>\n
Amid the diplomatic efforts, fighting continued on the front lines in eastern Ukraine, where Russia claimed on Saturday that its forces had seized two villages in the Donetsk region.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney arrived in Kyiv on Sunday morning for meetings with Zelenskyy.<\/p>\n
\u201cOn this special day \u2013 Ukraine\u2019s Independence Day \u2013 it is especially important for us to feel the support of our friends, and Canada has always stood by our side,\u201d Andriy Yermak, Zelenskyy\u2019s chief of staff, said.<\/p>\n
Norway announced significant new military aid on Sunday, pledging about 7 billion kroner ($695m) for air defence systems.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Russia has accused Ukraine of carrying out a drone attack on a nuclear plant that has caused a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":369810,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7655],"tags":[299,12,332,7661,657],"class_list":{"0":"post-369809","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-russia","8":"tag-europe","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-russia","11":"tag-russia-ukraine-war","12":"tag-ukraine"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115083966173168943","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/369809","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=369809"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/369809\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/369810"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=369809"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=369809"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=369809"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}