Kremlin says drone attack in Bryansk does not bring Putin-Zelenskyy talks closer

Kremlin foreign policy aide Yury Ushakov said on Thursday that Kyiv’s actions, including the reported drone strike on a bus carrying Belarusian children in Russia’s Bryansk region, do not help advance contacts between the Russian and Ukrainian presidents.

Speaking in an interview with Russian broadcaster VGTRK, Ushakov said: "All this does not bring personal contacts between the head of the Kyiv regime and our president any closer."

Asked whether the Kremlin held contacts with the administration of US President Donald Trump following the recent Group of Seven summit, Ushakov said there had been no such contacts.

Ushakov noted that the conflict in Ukraine was discussed extensively during the gathering of G7 leaders.

He alleged that European participants had sought to influence Trump with "unhelpful" and "harmful" ideas regarding the conflict.

"Europeans clearly insist that the war should continue. Moreover, they are guided by a completely wrong, false postulate that the situation on the battlefield is allegedly changing in favor of the Ukrainian forces, which is categorically wrong," Ushakov said.

Ushakov said Trump maintained his own views despite pressure from European allies.

The Kremlin aide also said that US negotiators Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff were expected to visit Russia, although no dates had been set.

"Both negotiators — both Kushner and Witkoff — will visit Russia in the near future. At the moment, the situation is such that they are still, as I understand it, busy with Iranian affairs and will be present at the start of work on the main agreement, so specific dates for the visit to Moscow have not yet been set," he said.