Russia’s Defence Ministry said it destroyed 1,015 Ukrainian drones overnight Saturday into Sunday across 15 regions, Crimea and the Black Sea — the largest one-night count Moscow has ever published, according to CNN. Fires hit the Petersburg Oil Terminal (capacity 12.5 million tons per year), the Ruchi oil depot, an Ozon logistics centre and a VK data centre. Officials said one person was killed, five wounded, and about 20,000 lost power in the Leningrad region.
The barrage came as the U.S.-Ukraine relationship hit its roughest public patch of the war. President Donald Trump took to Truth Social on Sunday to accuse Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky of not wanting to end the war: “He doesn’t want to end this war, and probably never did.” Trump said he is “in the process of negotiating Peace” and doesn’t want to “drive, foolishly, Russia away from the bargaining table,” insisting “great progress is being made.”
Separately, the Wall Street Journal reported via Reuters on Sunday that Putin has proposed a trilateral summit with Trump and Xi Jinping next month on the APEC sidelines in Shenzhen (Nov. 18–19) to discuss a Ukraine settlement on Moscow-favoured terms. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov confirmed talks are underway; a senior U.S. official said Trump has not agreed but could be receptive.
Zelensky pushed back on NBC’s Meet the Press on Sunday, warning that the U.S. siding with Russia would be a “historic mistake” and calling the sanctions waiver “more support for Russian aggression.”
The dispute sharpened on Friday, when Trump signed an executive order waiving sanctions mandated by Congress — the bipartisan Graham Act — including lifting sanctions on Russian diesel imports, days before they took effect. Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced a 60-day review of sanctions’ impact. A dozen senators from both parties condemned the move while Congress is in recess until after November 3; Sen. James Lankford defended it on Meet the Press as “choosing the American people first” amid soaring gas prices.
U.S. intelligence sharing with Ukraine was blocked for three days during Russian ballistic attacks but has since been restored, CNN reported; a Ukrainian source told CNN there was no early warning before Sunday’s ballistic attack on Kyiv — the third time in a week. Zelensky separately claimed Starlink drone-guidance speeds were curtailed — “a message from the American government” — which the Trump administration denies.
In a post on X Sunday, Zelensky said that since Trump’s energy ceasefire took hold a week ago, Russia has deliberately attacked Ukraine’s energy and oil and gas sectors 76 times — with 2,700 attack drones, 1,700 aerial bombs and 66 missiles in the past week, and 11 killed and about 50 injured in Russian strikes in 24 hours.
Why it matters
The fracture between Washington and Kyiv matters beyond the battlefield. With winter approaching, millions of Ukrainian civilians face cold and blackouts. For Americans, the talks’ trajectory is landing at the pump: the diesel-sanctions waiver is aimed at fuel costs, and 71 percent of adults already call gasoline unaffordable. Washington drifting toward a Moscow-accommodating track — a Putin-Xi summit on Russia-favoured terms, waived sanctions, blame aimed at Zelensky — is the sharpest turn in the war’s diplomacy since Trump returned to office.
What happens next
The proposed APEC-sidelines summit is set for November 18–19. Whether Trump agrees to sit down with Putin and Xi will signal how far the U.S. is willing to go toward Moscow’s preferred settlement. Ukraine’s record barrage invites Russian retaliation, likely against energy targets, as winter looms.
