Volodymyr Zelensky has urged Donald Trump to broker a peace deal in Ukraine like he did in the Middle East as he held a “very positive and productive” phone call following a major Russian attack on Kyiv’s energy infrastructure.

President Zelenskyy held back-to-back productive talks with President Donald Trump as Russia escalated strikes on Ukraine’s power grid ahead of winter. Kyiv seeks long-range precision weapons and stronger sanctions on Russian oil buyers to strengthen air defence and resilience against ongoing attacks.

Almost 900 miles from Ukraine’s borders, a fire erupted at a Russian oil refinery on Saturday. The blaze – a result of a strike by Ukrainian long-range drones, according to sources in the country’s security services – was the third at the facility in the last month alone.

Russia struck Ukraine’s power grid overnight into Sunday, damaging energy infrastructure in multiple regions and wounding two employees of the country’s largest private energy company.

Russia’s war in Ukraine has sparked a demographic crisis and labor shortage, fueled by military casualties, emigration, and a shrinking population with economic impacts.

YG then called in artillery strikes. We watched as the first one struck about 20 yards from the trees where the Russians were hiding. The second landed on the opposite side but almost as far away, leaving a visible crater in the earth. It was time to send in an assault team.

The soldier took up arms a decade ago to defend her home region, Donetsk, where Ukraine has been battling Russian-backed forces since 2014. Since Russia’s full-scale invasion in 2022, the region has become synonymous with Ukraine’s fight for survival. Battlefield developments in Donetsk are considered a gauge of each side’s fortunes in the war.

A Russian MiG-31 fighter jet crashed while attempting to land in the western Lipetsk region near the border with Ukraine, the Russian defence ministry said. The aircraft reportedly crashed in an uninhabited area in Lipetsk, which is about 300km (190 miles) from Ukraine's eastern border.