Ukraine-Russia war latest: US to host Kyiv team for minerals deal talks while Trump demands Putin stop bombing

Anger and outrage gripped the hometown of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Monday as it held funerals for some of the 20 people, including nine children, killed by a Russian missile that tore through apartment buildings and blasted a playground.

More than 70 were wounded in the attack last Friday evening on Kryvyi Rih.

The children were playing on swings and in a sandbox in a tree-lined park at the time. Bodies were strewn across the grass.

"We are not asking for pity," Oleksandr Vilkul, the head of the city administration, wrote on Telegram as Kryvyi Rih mourned.

"We demand the world's outrage."

The UN Human Rights Office in Ukraine said it was the deadliest single verified strike harming children since the start of Russia's full-scale invasion in February 2022. It was also one of the deadliest attacks so far this year.

A Russian court in Vladivostok has slightly reduced the prison sentence of US soldier Gordon Black, who was jailed last year for stealing $113 (10,000 rubles) from his girlfriend and threatening to kill her, Russian state news agencies reported on Monday.

According to RIA and TASS, which cited court proceedings, the court lowered Mr Black's sentence from three years and nine months to three years and two months.

Days after a Russian ballistic missile killed 20 people in Ukraine president Volodymyr Zelensky’s home town, French president Emmanuel Macron called for “strong action” if Russia continued to “refuse peace”.

He wrote on X on Sunday: “My thoughts are with the children and all civilian victims of the bloody attacks carried out by Russia, including on 4 April in Kryvyi Rih.

“A ceasefire is needed as soon as possible. And strong action if Russia continues to try to buy time and refuse peace.”

Mr Macron said that although Ukraine accepted US president Donald Trump’s proposal for a full ceasefire, and European nations were also working to broker peace, “Russia is continuing the war with renewed intensity, with no regard for civilians”.

Restarting the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant — currently occupied by Russia — would be unsafe and extremely difficult under wartime conditions, according to Ukraine’s nuclear energy chief, Petro Kotin.

He warned that restarting even one reactor during the war is “impossible” due to a lack of cooling water, personnel, and power.

If Ukraine regains control, it could take two months to two years to safely bring the plant back online after full demilitarisation and safety checks, the chief executive of Energoatom said, according to The Guardian.

Russia has said it intends to restart the plant when conditions allow, but experts have raised serious safety concerns, especially given the degraded infrastructure, risk of mines, and untrained staff.

In February this year, Alexey Likhachev, head of Russian nuclear operator Rosatom, said it would be restarted when “military and political conditions allow”.

Ukraine will send a delegation to Washington next week to negotiate a new draft agreement that could give the US access to Ukraine’s valuable mineral resources, including titanium, lithium, and uranium, economy minister Yuliia Svyrydenko told the Associated Press.

The draft, submitted by the US after weeks of silence, is more expansive than an earlier framework and could require approval by Ukraine’s parliament, she said.

The talks follow earlier tensions, including a contentious Oval Office meeting between Donald Trump, US vice president JD Vance, and president Volodymyr Zelensky.

Critics argue the deal risks undermining Ukraine’s sovereignty and EU membership prospects.

Ms Svyrydenko stressed that the US draft reflects only one side’s position and is not final. “What we have now is a document that reflects the position of the US Treasury legal team. This is not a final version, it’s not a joint position.”

She said that Ukraine is preparing to define its red lines, especially over control of a proposed joint fund to manage revenues from natural resources.

“It’s clear that the full parameters of this agreement can’t be discussed online,” Ms Svyrydenko said. “We need to sit down with the teams and continue the conversation in person.”

Kevin Hassett, director of the National Economic Council at the White House, said Russia was excluded from the US tariff list because of ongoing peace negotiations with Ukraine.

US president Donald Trump “made the decision not to conflate the two issues”, Mr Hassett told ABC News, stressing that “it’s not appropriate to throw a new thing into these negotiations right in the middle of it. It’s just not”.

He warned that adding tariffs could disrupt diplomacy. “Would you literally advise that you go in and put a whole bunch of new things on the table in the middle of a negotiation that affects so many Ukrainian and Russian lives? No, no.”

Trump’s new tariff policy imposed tariffs on nearly all major US trading partners, including a 10 per cent duty on Ukraine, but excluded Russia, Belarus, North Korea, and Cuba.

Ukraine’s economy minister Yuliia Svyrydenko said the tariffs are “difficult, but not critical” for Ukraine.

Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky said Russian attacks from the Black Sea on Sunday show why Moscow is refusing an unconditional ceasefire.

He said that “they want to preserve their ability to strike our cities and ports from the sea”.

He said that a ceasefire at sea is crucial for security and peace, suggesting Vladimir Putin does not want to end the war.

“He is looking for ways to preserve the option of reigniting it at any moment, with even greater force.”

US president Donald Trump renewed his call for a ceasefire in the Russia-Ukraine war on Sunday, urging Russian president Vladimir Putin to stop the violence.

“We are talking to Russia. We would like them to stop,” Trump told reporters onboard Air Force One.

“I don’t like the bombing, the bombing goes on and on, and every week thousands of young people being killed.”

His comments come after president Volodymyr Zelensky called on the West to amp up pressure on Russia after it launched its latest deadly air raid on Kyiv.

“Putin does not want to end the war, he is looking for ways to preserve the option of reigniting it at any moment, with even greater force,” Zelensky said in his evening address yesterday.

“That’s exactly why all forms of pressure on Russia must continue: strengthening our ability to defend ourselves, maintaining sanctions, and ensuring that diplomacy – any conversation with Moscow – leaves them no opportunity to kill.”