Vitaliy Shevchenko
Russia editor, BBC Monitoring

As uncertaintycontinues over what specific proposals are being discussed in the ongoingUkraine settlement talks, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov says Moscowis keen to learn about the latest negotiations held between the US and Ukraineover the past few days.

“It is nowimportant for us to understand what the results of that work are”, he tells a daily news briefing. “We do not know what differences of opinion thereare exactly.”

In turn, RustemUmerov, the lead Ukrainian negotiator involved in the talks, said earlier they focused on finding out what the US and Russia had discussed ata meeting in Kremlin last Tuesday – as well as what specific proposals were onthe table.

Peskov alsopraises thenew National Security Strategy unveiled by the US last week – more on that here.

“Wedefinitely like the focal points we’ve seen in the new concept. It speaks ofthe need for dialogue and building constructive, good relations,” he says.”We cannot but like it, it matches our vision.”

The strategy issharply critical of Europe and says Washington will prioritise building”strategic stability with Russia”.

Ukraine is dealing with “a totally different United States as we knew it,” says Ukrainian MP Ivanna Klympush-Tsintsadze.

She claims that “unfortunately the US right now does not care that much about the international law”, speaking about US support for a peace plan that would require Ukraine conceding parts of its territory.

Klympush-Tsintsadze tells BBC News “there is no Ukrainian that would love that deal.” Right now, she says, it is crucial that Ukraine works with its European partners.

Joel Gunter
Reporting from Kyiv

President Trump is once again pressuring President Zelensky to accept a deal that many people here fear will benefit Russia and trample over Ukraine’s demands.

Trump said last night that Zelensky’s “people” love the deal the US is pushing, and implied that the Ukrainian president was the obstacle to peace.

Responding to Trump’s remarks today, Ukrainian civilians say they are sceptical about the US president’s agenda.

“There is not a single conscious Ukrainian in my personal circle who would support Trump’s peace plan,” says Yana Kolomiets, 31, a casting director from Odesa, which has been badly hit by Russian drone strikes.

“Our country was attacked, and now we have to accept all the rules, give up territories under our control and then reduce the size of our army?” she says. “The war must be ended, but not like this.”

On the whole, Trump is not being taken seriously here as someone with Ukraine’s best interests at heart.

He is “only interested in ticking another box on the list of wars he has ended, without understanding who is actually at fault”, says Iryna Dobrutska, a marketing worker in Kyiv.

For Ukrainians, the idea of giving up territory that Russia has been unable to capture on the battlefield is an emotional one, as is giving up sovereignty over the size of its army and other issues.

But Russia’s apparent advantage on the battlefield means that it is “not really interested in anything constructive”, says Maryna Stepanenko, a Ukrainian journalist.

“Ukraine, as always, will be forced to sign whatever is on the table,” she says.

A familiar moment in the diplomatic cyclepublished at 11:13 GMT

James Landale
Diplomatic correspondent

We’re at the now familiar moment in the diplomatic cycle where Donald Trump starts expressing a bit of frustration with the Ukrainian side for not backing down – and the Europeans gather around Zelensky – providing a sort of protective huddle.

The crucial issues are that the Russians want to take part of eastern Ukraine that they haven’t conquered militarily, and the Ukrainians are still looking for security guarantees.

That’s to ensure that if there is a deal, they deter any future Russian invasion.

And despite all the meetings and talks, we don’t know the details of what Ukraine is being asked to concede.

Ukrainian President Zelensky will head to Brussels to meet Nato chief Mark Rutte later today, the organisation says.

It adds that the pair will be be joined by European Council President Antonio Costa and European Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen.

UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer says there needs to be “hard-edged security guarantees” in a peace deal for Ukraine.

“If there is to be a ceasefire, it needs to be just – because Ukraine has taken heavy, heavy losses and paid a heavy price for a war which was not of their making,” Starmer tells the Press Association.

He says there needs to be strong security guarantees so that Russian President Vladimir Putin respects any agreement.

Starmer also praises US President Donald Trump. He says Trump has progressed peace negotiations “the furthest we’ve got in the four years”, in just a few weeks.

Peace talks are complicated, he says, “but I do think that we’re making progress.”

If you’re just joining us, we’re waiting for Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to meet with some of his country’s key European allies in London later today.

They’ll discuss ongoing peace talks, including the latest draft proposal to end the war that is being pushed by the White House.

Ukrainian officials spent three days last week with US negotiators in Florida pushing for changes to that plan, which – in its original form – was widely considered favourable to Russia.

Today, Zelensky will head to Downing Street for a meeting with UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer, French President Emmanuel Macron, and German Chancellor Friedrich Merz.

Elsewhere, UK Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper will fly to Washington for talks with her US counterpart, Marco Rubio, on a number of topics – including the Ukraine peace proposal.

Katie Williams
Live reporter

A lot of diplomacy has taken place in the weeks leading up to today’s meeting in London. Here’s a recap of how these most recent talks have progressed:

28-point peace plan

In November, details of a US-backed 28-point peace plan emerged. This was widely seen as favourable to Russia, requiring Ukraine to concede territory, reduce the size of its army, and pledge not to join Nato.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said his country risked either losing its dignity, or losing US support. European allies criticised the plan, saying it was too favourable to Russia.

Geneva talks

Talks followed in Geneva on 23 November, with delegations sent by the US, Ukraine and its European allies.

Details of a European counter-proposal were widely reported, including by news agency Reuters, with terms more favourable to Ukraine.

The BBC could not independently verify its contents, but it reportedly allowed for Ukraine’s inclusion in Nato and proposed security guarantees.

Russia-US talks

Five hours of talks between Russian President Vladimir Putin and US envoy Steve Witkoff at the start of December failed to produce a breakthrough.

A Kremlin spokesman said the Moscow meeting was “constructive”, but parts of the plan remained unacceptable to Russia.

US-Ukraine talks

Three days of talks took place in Miami last week between Witkoff and senior Ukrainian negotiator Rustem Umerov.

A revised draft of the peace proposal was put together during these talks. US President Donald Trump claimed Zelensky’s negotiators “love” the latest plan, but added that he is “a little bit disappointed that President Zelensky hasn’t yet read the proposal”.

As Trump made his comments, Zelensky said he would be briefed by his negotiators, adding “some issues can only be discussed in person”.

Trump’s former US ambassador to the European Union, Gordon Sondland, says Donald Trump wants Europe to take the lead with Russia in the future.

“The US can back up, the United States can support, but it’s really Europe that needs to beout front, and that’s really where Donald Trump is going here,” he tells BBC Radio 4’s Today programme.

“He understands that if we conduct business as usual, the waywe’ve conducted business vis-a-vis Russia for the last, say, 30 years, it wouldbe the United States that would be directly engaging with Russia, trying toresolve this, making whatever threats are necessary to Putin to get him to backdown,” Sondland says.

“And were he not to accede to our demands, we would be the ones in aconflict, and Europe would be watching, and that’s not what Trump wants to dothis time.”

Europe should have “one consolidated position when dealing with President Trump”, says the chair of Ukraine’s Foreign Affairs Committee.

Oleksandr Merezhko tells BBC Radio 5 Live that Ukraine is grateful for the ongoing help and support it has had from its European allies and is optimistic for today’s meeting.

But when it comes to Trump, Merezhko says he’s “extremely sceptical” about the outcome of negotiations – and calls Putin’s demands “absurd and absolutely unacceptable”.

Three European leaders working with Ukraine is an “extremely effective” format for communicating with the US, he says, to “persuade President Trump to be on the right side of history.”

Elsewhere today, British Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper will fly to Washington for talks with her US counterpart, Marco Rubio.

Cooper is expected to focus on efforts to secure an end to the war in Ukraine, as well as UK-US cooperation on global security and the ceasefire in Gaza.

“The UK and US will reaffirm their commitment to reaching a peace deal in Ukraine,” the UK’s Foreign Office said when announcing Cooper’s trip.

It comes days after she announced an extra £10m in UK funding for Ukraine, aimed at supporting energy infrastructure repairs.

Vitaliy Shevchenko
Russia editor, BBC Monitoring

Ukraine’s air force says it intercepted 131 out of 149 drones launched by Russia overnight.

No missiles were involved in the aerial attack, and the number of drones is relatively low compared to the 175 launched the previous night – and 585 between Friday and Saturday.

According to Ukrainian officials, the Russian drones that were not intercepted last night:

• Killed a 51-year-old civilian man in Kryvyi Rih, central Ukraine
• Wounded seven residents of a high-rise building in Okhtyrka, northern Ukraine – more on that in our previous post
• Injured three residents of an apartment block in Chernihiv, another city in northern Ukraine
• Caused a fire in Fastiv, a town outside Kyiv

At least seven people have been injured overnight following Russian strikes on the northeastern city of Okhtyrka in the Sumy region, according to the region’s governor Oleg Grigorov.

That, he says, was after a drone hit a block of flats.

BBC Monitoring is reporting this morning that casualties and damage have also been reported in Chernihiv and Dnipropetrovsk.

It comes after four civilians were killed by Russian attacks on Sunday. President Zelensky said that in the last week alone, Ukraine has been assailed by 1,600 Russian drones, guided bombs and nearly 70 missiles.

More now on those three days of talks in Miami.

Zelensky’s chief negotiator, Rustem Umerov, used the meeting to push Donald Trump’s close aides – special envoy Steve Witkoff and son-in-law Jared Kushner – for changes to a White House plan to end the war, which was widely considered to accommodate key Kremlin demands.

For weeks Washington has been pushing Kyiv and Moscow to swiftly agree to its plan to end the war.

But there has been little sign of a breakthrough.

That’s including after Witkoff held five hours of in-person talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow last week.

As well as security guarantees, negotiations remain particularly fraught around the issue of territorial concessions.

The second day of talks in Florida ended with the US and Ukraine agreeing a framework for post-war security, and reviewing plans for recovery.

But, over the weekend, officials in Washington and Kyiv said any “real progress” towards ending the war in Ukraine depends on Moscow showing a “serious commitment” to long-term peace.

We have some fresh comments to bring you from Volodymyr Zelensky’s new chief negotiator Rustem Umerov who has been reflecting on the weekend of talks in Florida.

“The primary task of the Ukrainian team was to obtain from the American side complete information about their conversation in Moscow and all drafts of current proposals in order to discuss them in detail with the President of Ukraine,” Umerov writes on X, while expressing thanks for “constructive work”.

“Together with all partners, we must do everything possible for a dignified end to this war.”

Umerov adds that Zelensky will be fully briefed on the latest talks.

“We are working as intensively as possible,” Umerov says.

Western unity now under extraordinary strain – while Ukraine’s survival is at stakepublished at 07:38 GMT

Vitaliy Shevchenko
Russia editor, BBC Monitoring

Today’s meeting in London comes at a crucial time for everyone attending it, as Donald Trump’s administration is drifting away from them and towards Russia.

Last week saw the publication of America’s National Security Strategy, external, which was sharply critical of Europe, but not Russia.

The past few weeks also saw several rounds of talks on Ukraine settlement, in which US negotiators appeared to back Russia’s demands, putting pressure on the Ukrainians to give up land and make other concessions.

Ukraine will be hoping today to see if Europe is able to fill the enormous void left by the US after it stopped almost all assistance.

European leaders will likely discuss whether it is still possible to bring Trump back into the fold, or whether Europe will have to go it alone – on Ukraine and on other issues.

Western unity is now under extraordinary strain, but the situation is much worse for Ukraine as its very survival is at stake.

On Sunday night, Donald Trump claimed Volodymyr Zelensky had not read the latest proposal on how to end Ukraine’s war with Russia.

Speaking to reporters in Washington at the Kennedy Centre, Trump insisted that Zelensky’s “people” – who have been holding talks in Florida with US officials – “love” the plan.

“Russia’s fine with it,” Trump remarked. “Russia’s you know, Russia I guess would rather have the whole country when you think of it. But Russia is, I believe, fine with it, but I’m not sure that Zelensky is fine with it.”

Zelensky has previously objected to suggestions that Ukraine should hand over territory to Russia, and limit its defence capabilities.

On Monday morning, in his weekly address to Ukraine, Zelensky said “substantive discussions” had been held with Trump’s envoys.

He added: “The American envoys are aware of Ukraine’s core positions, and the conversation was constructive, though not easy. We continue our work. Some issues can only be discussed in person.”

Alex Smith
Live editor

Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky will meet key European allies in London later today, as a US-led push for an end to the war in Ukraine continues.

Last week, Ukrainian officials met US negotiators in Florida for three days of talks – where Zelensky’s chiefnegotiator pushed for changes to a White House plan widely considered favourable to Russia.

Both sides said there was progress, but following thosetalks US President Donald Trump said he was “a little disappointed” inZelensky, claiming he “hasn’t yet read the proposal”. We’ll have more on that soon.

Today, Zelensky will join UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer,French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Friedrich Merz in Downing Street.

While these diplomatic efforts continue, so do Russianstrikes on Ukraine. Overnight at least seven people were injured when Russiandrones struck an apartment block in the north-eastern Ukrainian city ofOkhtyrka, according to the region’s governor.