West Palm Beach, Florida: Ukrainian and European officials have rejected Moscow’s claims that Ukraine targeted a personal residence of Russian President Vladimir Putin with a drone attack, an incident that threatens to disrupt US-led peace negotiations.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov this week alleged that Ukraine tried to attack Putin’s residence in the northern Novgorod region with dozens of drones, adding that Moscow would review its negotiating position as a result.
This image made from undated video provided by the Russian Defence Ministry Press Service shows a man standing by what it said was a downed drone involved in an alleged attack on a residence of President Vladimir Putin.Credit: AP
US national security officials found that Ukraine did not target Putin or one of his residences in a drone strike, the Wall Street Journal reported on Wednesday. The paper reported the conclusion was supported by a CIA assessment that found no attempt to target Putin or one of his residences. A CIA spokesperson could not be immediately reached for comment.
US President Donald Trump initially expressed sympathy for the Russian charge, telling reporters on Monday that Putin had informed him of the alleged incident and that he was “very angry” about it.
By Wednesday, he appeared more sceptical, sharing on social media a New York Post editorial accusing Russia of blocking peace in Ukraine.
A source familiar with the issue said on condition of anonymity that Trump reposted the editorial after he was briefed on Putin’s allegations by CIA director John Ratcliffe. The source declined to disclose any details of Ratcliffe’s briefing.
Ukraine’s Foreign Ministry said the Russian footage was “laughable”.Credit: AP
Ukraine has denied it carried out such an attack, describing the allegation as a Russian disinformation campaign meant to drive a wedge between Kyiv and Washington after a meeting between Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky that both sides described as cordial and productive.
In a detailed briefing paper that Ukraine distributed to European Union delegations this week, seen by Reuters, Kyiv alleged the Russian allegations were designed to “sabotage” agreements made during the Florida meeting between Trump and Zelensky.
On Wednesday, Kaja Kallas, the EU’s top diplomat, called Russia’s claims “a deliberate distraction”.
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“No one should accept unfounded claims from the aggressor who has indiscriminately targeted Ukraine’s infrastructure and civilians since the start of the war,” she wrote on X.
As of Wednesday, there was no independent confirmation of the attack. But Russia’s charges – and the European and Ukrainian reaction – underscored how both sides have sought to shape Trump’s view of the war in Ukraine, now nearly four years old.
“There is no evidence” that Putin seeks peace and wants Ukraine to be successful, as Trump asserted last weekend after speaking to the Russian leader, said Kurt Volker, a former US ambassador to NATO who served as special representative for Ukraine negotiations during Trump’s first term.
“All evidence is to the contrary,” he said.
The Russian and Ukrainian embassies in Washington did not immediately respond to requests for comment. The White House also did not immediately respond.
On Wednesday, Russia’s defence ministry released video footage showing a senior officer, Major General Alexander Romanenkov, setting out details of how Moscow says it believes Ukraine attacked Putin’s Novgorod residence.
The video included footage of a Russian serviceman standing next to fragments of a device claimed to be a downed Ukrainian Chaklun-V drone carrying a six-kilogram explosive device, which had not detonated. Reuters could not confirm the location and the date of the footage and model of the destroyed device could not be immediately verified.
Ukrainian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Heorhii Tykhyi said the footage was “laughable” and that Kyiv was “absolutely confident that no such attack took place”.
Before Lavrov made his accusation on Monday, Novgorod Governor Alexander Dronov said air defence and fighter jets were shooting down Ukrainian drones.
Russia claimed the downed drone was Ukrainian Chaklun-V model carrying a 6kg explosive device, which had not detonated. Reuters could not confirm the location or the date of the footage.Credit: AP
While Trump said on Monday that the attack could have been a Russian false flag operation, he has at times appeared willing to accept controversial statements by Putin at face value. The US president last year repeated Putin’s assertions that Russian forces had encircled Ukrainian forces in Russia’s Kursk region, even as US intelligence indicated that was not true.
The debate over the alleged Ukrainian attack also comes as some Western intelligence officials quietly argued that Russia sought to delay additional punitive moves by Washington designed to force Moscow into a peace deal.
In the Ukrainian briefing paper, Kyiv noted that in the hours after the alleged attack, various Russian officials made extremely similar comments in public that – in Ukraine’s view – suggested a premeditated co-ordination among officials in Moscow.
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The Ukrainian paper also noted that residents of a town near Putin’s Novgorod residence told local media they heard no sounds of air defences on the night of the alleged attack.
The Russian defence ministry published inconsistent accounts of the alleged Ukrainian drone attacks.
In a statement posted late on Sunday on its channel on the Telegram messaging platform, the ministry said 89 long-range Ukrainian attack drones were intercepted around the country between 7am the day before and 11pm that evening.
They included 18 that were hit over the Novgorod region, it said, without alleging that any were involved in an attack on Putin’s residence there.
On Monday afternoon, the ministry issued a second statement that its air defences had intercepted 91 drones, all of them bound for Putin’s residence, including 41 that were hit over Novgorod, between Saturday and Sunday.
