Zelenskyy condemns 'brutal' Russian rocket attack after 3 killed in
Ukrainian city
[June 03, 2025]
By ILLIA NOVIKOV
KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — A Russian attack on the Ukrainian city of Sumy on
Tuesday, in which at least three people were killed and many others
injured, was described by President Volodymyr Zelenskyy as “brutal.”
According to authorities, a barrage of multiple rockets struck apartment
buildings and a medical facility in the center of the northeastern city
a day after direct peace talks made no progress on ending the 3-year
war.
Zelenskyy said one of the rockets fired at Sumy pierced the wall of an
apartment building but failed to detonate.
“That’s all you need to know about Russia’s ‘desire’ to end this war,”
Zelenskyy wrote in a post on Telegram. “It is clear that without global
pressure, without decisive action from the United States, Europe, and
everyone in the world who holds power, (Russian President Vladimir)
Putin will not agree even to a ceasefire.”
At talks in Istanbul on Monday, delegations from the warring countries
agreed to swap dead and wounded troops. But their terms for ending the
war remained far apart.
The war has killed more than 12,000 Ukrainian civilians, according to
the United Nations, as well as tens of thousands of soldiers on both
sides along the roughly 1,000-kilometer (620-mile) front line where the
war of attrition is grinding on despite U.S.-led efforts to broker a
peace deal.
Though Russia has a bigger army and more economic resources than
Ukraine, a spectacular Ukrainian drone attack that Ukrainian officials
said damaged or destroyed more than 40 warplanes at air bases deep
inside Russia was a serious blow to the Kremlin’s strategic arsenal and
its military prestige.
Both Zelenskyy and Putin have been eager to show U.S. President Donald
Trump that they share his ambition to end the fighting, thereby aiming
to avoid possible punitive measures from Washington. Ukraine has
accepted a U.S.-proposed ceasefire, but the Kremlin effectively rejected
it. Putin has made it clear that any peace settlement has to be on his
terms.
A senior Ukrainian delegation led by First Deputy Prime Minister and
Economy Minister Yuliia Svyrydenko has travelled to Washington for talks
about defense, sanctions and postwar recovery, Andrii Yermak, the head
of Ukraine's presidential office, said Tuesday.
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The delegation will meet with representatives from both major U.S.
political parties, as well as with advisors to Trump, Yermak added.
Dmitry Medvedev, a former Russian president who now serves as deputy
head of the country’s Security Council chaired by Putin, indicated
Tuesday there would be no let-up in Russia’s invasion of its neighbor.
“The Istanbul talks are not for striking a compromise peace on someone
else’s delusional terms but for ensuring our swift victory and the
complete destruction of (Ukraine’s government),” he said.
In an apparent comment on the latest Ukrainian strikes, he declared that
“retribution is inevitable.”
“Our army is pushing forward and will continue to advance,” Medvedev
said, adding that “everything that needs to be blown up will be blown
up, and those who must be eliminated will be.”
Ukrainians on the streets of Kyiv welcomed their country’s stunning
drone strike on Russian air bases but were gloomy about the chances for
a peace agreement.
The Russians “won’t negotiate peace with anyone,” said 43-year-old
Ukrainian serviceman Oleh Nikolenko. “Russia has invested too many
resources in this war to just … stop for nothing.”
Anastasia Nikolenko, a 38-year-old designer, said diplomacy can’t stop
the fighting. "We need to show by force, by physical force, that we
cannot be defeated,” she said.
Russia has recently expanded its attacks on Sumy and in the Kharkiv
region following Putin’s promise to create a buffer zone along the
border that might prevent long-range Ukrainian attacks hitting Russian
soil.
Sumy is about 25 kilometers (15 miles) from the Russian border. It had a
prewar population of around 250,000.
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