KYIV, Ukraine — Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Tuesday that Kyiv is once again receiving early warnings from its partners about incoming Russian missiles following recent strikes that he said occurred without enough notice, leaving civilians vulnerable. For at least a week, the Ukrainian leader has said that his country has not received early warnings about ballistic missiles aimed at the capital. Such intelligence, he said, saves lives by allowing the public to be alerted and giving military units time to try to intercept the missiles.
Zelenskyy said the change happened after talks with his American counterparts, including a phone call with U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio. "We are thankful that intelligence works now, and I'm speaking about early warning, which is very important for our people, for children, adults, civilians, because we can hear when ballistic is coming," Zelenskyy said on a visit to Norway.
"So we are thankful to American side now that it works." Speaking to reporters in India, Rubio acknowledged mutual frustration between the U.S. and Ukraine over intelligence sharing and weapons supplies but emphatically denied that the Trump administration has made any changes to previous policy on either issue. In other developments, Russia unleashed another missile and drone blitz of civilian areas in Ukraine, killing at least nine people, officials said, as Zelenskyy sought more American and European help. Zelenskyy was joined in Norway by U.S. envoy Steve Witkoff, who has tried without success to steer Russia and Ukraine toward a settlement to end the war.
Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre and Finnish President Alexander Stubb also met with the Ukrainian president in Norway's capital. Gahr Støre said Witkoff planned to fly to St. Petersburg on Wednesday to meet with Russian leaders, exchange ideas from the Oslo meeting and share proposals from European and American colleagues.
"Today was a good day for peace," Stubb said. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said Moscow is willing to listen to new U.S. proposals about Ukraine but doesn't expect any "miracle" from Washington. At the White House, President Donald Trump stepped up the pressure on Zelenskyy to come to an agreement with Russia as relations between the two men have soured again.
"We want Zelenskyy to make a deal," Trump told reporters in the Oval Office. "We've given a lot to Ukraine. We've gotten absolutely nothing back except grief, death, tremendous monetary loss." If that doesn't happen, "I think it's going to be a very bad thing." The conversation with Rubio came after Zelenskyy told a bipartisan group of U.S. lawmakers Monday that he believes "some political decision has been made to slow down ... support for us." Ukraine has nearly run out of American-made Patriot air-defense interceptors that it needs to stop Russian ballistic missiles, according to Zelenskyy, who has pleaded for Washington to send more.
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