Zelensky to press Trump on air defences while in Washington

Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky is scheduled to meet with US President Donald Trump at the White House to press for firmer commitments on bolstering Kyiv’s anti‑ballistic missile defences. Zelensky arrived in Washington at a pivotal moment in Russia’s full‑scale invasion of Ukraine, after Moscow officials said the capital had been struck by 390 drones in a matter of hours overnight. He is expected to urge Trump to follow through on the licence the US president granted earlier this period that would allow Kyiv to produce Patriot interceptor missiles. Russian forces have intensified deadly ballistic‑missile strikes on Ukraine’s capital, and Zelensky has repeatedly said interceptors are urgently needed. Patriot systems have topped Zelensky’s wish list for some time, but the wars in Ukraine and the Middle East have left these US aerial‑defence interceptors in extremely short supply. While promising a licence is one step, co‑producing the sophisticated PAC‑2 and PAC‑3 interceptors on Ukrainian territory presents another challenge, requiring a prolonged political, legal and technical process. A Raytheon delegation visited Kyiv last week, and Zelensky said the defence contractor expressed “readiness to take our concern to an adjacent higher level.” After his talks with Zelensky, Trump will hold another high‑level meeting – with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. This will be the first face‑to‑face encounter between the two leaders since the Iran‑related conflict began in late February. Zelensky and Netanyahu are in Washington to attend the funeral of Senator Lindsey Graham, who died this period at age 71. The Ukraine conflict has overlapped with the US‑Israel confrontation with Iran over the weekend, when Ukrainian forces struck an Iranian cargo vessel in the Caspian Sea. Kyiv has labelled Iran a “direct accomplice to Russian aggression against Ukraine,” and Zelensky said Ukrainian intelligence shows Russia has shared satellite imagery with Tehran, enabling Iran to target US military sites and Gulf states. Trump responded, “I’ll find out if that's true. I'll ask Putin about it,” adding that if the claim proved accurate, it would have “no interaction at all.” In Moscow, Mayor Sergei Sobyanin said more than 390 Ukrainian drones had struck the area between 20:30 on Monday and 06:30 on Tuesday, and that nearly all were intercepted by air defences. BBC Verify‑confirmed footage showed damage to a high‑rise building in Chekhov, south of the capital, and a fire at a warehouse in Berezhki to the west. Local officials in Chekhov reported no casualties. Since Zelensky’s last conversation with Trump in early July, Ukraine has repeatedly hit logistics centres, many tied to the Russian e‑commerce firm Wildberries, worsening difficulties for small and medium‑sized businesses in parts of Russia. Speaking at the Kremlin on Monday, President Vladimir Putin told members of the State Duma that their country’s enemies were using “terrorist methods” against civilians but would “never break” the Russian people. “We will execute our objectives and will together do everything for victory, for Russia,” he said. At the weekend, Putin was challenged on the war’s aims by Kazakh President Kassym‑Jomart Tokayev, who described the conflict’s origins as “not understandable.” Tokayev suggested a deal with Ukraine could be reached if hostilities paused for negotiations, saying, “Perhaps it is time to freeze this struggle and take to the Istanbul format 2.0,” a reference to talks that began shortly after Russia’s full‑scale invasion in 2022. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Monday that freezing the war now was impossible “given Kyiv's position.”