Five European defence ministers meet in Paris on Ukraine as Kremlin says talks mean no let-up in strikes

Defence ministers of France, Germany, Italy, Poland and the United Kingdom were meeting in Paris on Monday to discuss additional support for Ukraine, European defence and the conflict in the Middle East, according to French officials cited by Al Jazeera. At their previous meeting in Berlin in June, the five pledged continued backing for Kyiv.

Moscow: talks, but no pause in fighting

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said the decision to resume trilateral talks “does not imply any restrictions on combat operations” and that Russian forces were continuing “massive and sustained strikes” against Ukraine’s defence industry, TASS reported. Negotiators from Ukraine, Russia and the US are expected to meet in Abu Dhabi in the first half of November. Peskov said the local humanitarian arrangement for occupied Oleshky in Kherson region could serve as a precedent for other areas, while Russia’s Defence Ministry accused Ukraine of shelling the town before the planned truce.

Strikes continue

A Russian strike on Zaporizhzhia injured four people on Monday morning, according to regional governor Mykhailo Semikin, and two people were injured in Chernihiv region. Russia’s Defence Ministry claimed strikes on power stations in Kharkiv and Khmelnytskyi regions and on port infrastructure in Chornomorsk. In Russia, the Voronezh governor said a Ukrainian drone attack killed two people and wounded 17, many of them on a commuter train hit by debris. In an interview aired on Sunday, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Kyiv would stop striking Russian oil refineries only if Moscow stopped hitting Ukraine’s power grid.