8+ hour, 22+ min ago (560+ words) Ukrainian naval drones hit two sanctioned tankers in the Black Sea as they headed to a Russian port to load up with oil destined for foreign markets, an official said on Saturday, as Kyiv tries to pile pressure on Russia's vast oil industry. The two oil tankers, identified as the Kairos and Virat, were empty and sailing to Novorossiysk, a major Russian Black Sea oil terminal, the official at the Security Service of Ukraine told Reuters. Naval drones could be seen speeding towards hulking tankers followed by powerful explosions that caused fires on the vessels, video footage shared by the official showed. Reuters could not independently verify the identity of the tankers in the clips or the location and date of the footage. "Video shows that after being hit, both tankers sustained critical damage and were effectively taken out of…...

1+ day, 4+ hour ago (729+ words) Just as peace talks were gaining traction, Ukraine has lost its lead negotiator. Andriy Yermak, an ever-present figure at President Volodymyr Zelenskyy's side throughout the war with Russia, resigned as chief of staff on Friday after an anti-corruption raid at his home, injecting fresh uncertainty for Ukraine's leadership. The exit leaves a vacuum around Zelenskyy as talks accelerate, isolating the Ukrainian president at a critical moment and creating an opening Moscow may try to exploit, analysts say. The development capped a dramatic week, which began with Kyiv under intense pressure from President Donald Trump to endorse a plan that aligned with Moscow's hard-line demands. An initial deadline of Thursday, imposed by the White House, passed without any announcement as Ukraine and its allies pushed back against calls for the country to cede territory. Ukrainian negotiators, led by Yermak, secured changes,…...

1+ day, 19+ hour ago (1203+ words) KYIV, Ukraine " From his position on the eastern front lines, the original peace plan backed by President Donald Trump looked more like a proposal for Volodymyr Rzhavskyi's surrender. "It's not a plan. It's a real capitulation. There is nothing to discuss here," said Rzhavskyi, a senior sergeant serving near Pokrovsk, a supply hub under intense pressure from Russian forces for some 18 months. While Ukrainian officials fought for changes to the 28-point plan that emerged last week, NBC News spoke with soldiers in the country's embattled military who expressed frustration at the idea Moscow would be handed its hard-line demands but also hope that they might soon be able to return to their lives. "I am against giving up those parts of Donetsk region that we still hold," said Rzhavskyi, 44, who hails from the eastern industrial heartland he is now fighting…...

3+ day, 15+ hour ago (415+ words) Russia is ready for "serious" peace talks, Vladimir Putin said Thursday, adding that the draft of a plan discussed by the United States and Ukraine could form the basis of a future deal to end the conflict. The Russian leader said he felt that Washington was taking his position into account, but that some things still needed to be discussed when a U.S. delegation visits Moscow early next week. Speaking to reporters during a visit to Kyrgyzstan, Putin was responding for the first time since Kyiv secured changes to the proposal, which was initially viewed as too favorable to the Kremlin. President Donald Trump has touted "tremendous progress," but both the White House and Ukraine have indicated key points still needed to be hashed out. Trump had earmarked Thanksgiving as a date for more concrete announcements, and close observers of the…...

4+ day, 18+ hour ago (834+ words) Morning Rundown: FBI probes Democrats in "illegal orders" video, a dire warning for Ukraine, and drug prices slashed FBI looks to speak to the six Democrats that Trump accused of 'seditious behavior.' The U.S. told Ukraine it is better to negotiate a peace settlement now due to the dire situation on the battlefield. And, Medicare announces significant price cuts to 15 costly prescription drugs, including popular weight loss ones. Here's what to know today. The FBI is working to schedule interviews with the six Democratic lawmakers who appeared in a video urging members of the military and intelligence community not to comply with illegal orders, according to a person familiar with the efforts. The move comes days after President Donald Trump accused the Democrats, all of whom served in the military or in intelligence roles, of "SEDITIOUS BEHAVIOR, punishable by DEATH!," although…...

4+ day, 18+ hour ago (542+ words) The Kremlin said Wednesday that the leak of a phone call between senior U.S. and Russian officials was intended to disrupt peace talks, and warned it was premature to say a deal to end its war in Ukraine was close. President Donald Trump, whose envoy Steve Witkoff will visit Moscow next week, said his peace plan had been "fine-tuned" and that he had no deadline for an agreement after earlier pressuring Kyiv to endorse a proposal by Thanksgiving. Kyiv and its allies indicated they were broadly happy with changes to the plan, though key sticking points remained. As attention shifted to Russia, which has held to its maximalist demands, the leak added to questions about the Kremlin's role in negotiations. Yuri Ushakov, a foreign policy adviser to Vladimir Putin, suggested the leak of his conversation with Witkoff was an attempt to…...

5+ day, 4+ hour ago (1246+ words) In a meeting with Ukrainian officials in Kyiv last week, U.S. Army Secretary Dan Driscoll delivered a grim assessment. Driscoll told his counterparts their troops faced a dire situation on the battlefield and would suffer an imminent defeat against Russian forces, two sources with knowledge of the matter told NBC News. The Russians were ramping up the scale and pace of their aerial attacks, and they had the ability to fight on indefinitely, Driscoll told them, according to the sources. The situation for Ukraine would only get worse over time, he continued, and it was better to negotiate a peace settlement now rather than end up in an even weaker position in the future. And there was more bad news. The U.S. delegation also said America's defense industry could not keep supplying Ukraine with the weapons and air defenses at the rate…...

6+ day, 24+ min ago (830+ words) The pressure building on Ukraine is not just diplomatic. While President Donald Trump pushes for a quick resolution, the churning mud of the battlefield has produced only slow and painstaking gains for the Kremlin during the four years since its full-scale invasion. From the front-line city of Pokrovsk in eastern Donetsk to Zaporizhzhia in the south and the northern region of Kharkiv, there is little doubt that Russia is making advances. President Vladimir Putin has urged Ukraine to surrender key territory at the negotiating table " as Washington has suggested " or face Moscow's military taking it by force anyway. Trump has echoed this sentiment, warning that Ukraine "will lose in a short period of time" if it does not agree to the deal he has backed. But battlefield monitors suggest the picture is not quite so bleak for Ukraine as Trump…...

6+ day, 4+ hour ago (219+ words) Morning Rundown: Ukraine peace plan progress, no bumper Black Friday, and what's your brain age? President Donald Trump said on social media that "something good just may be happening" with the talks. Ukraine'and the United States were set for "intensive work" today after the two sides hailed progress in high-stakes talks over the new plan to end'Russia's war'that Washington has pressured Kyiv'to endorse by Thanksgiving. Meetings in Geneva produced an "updated and refined peace framework," Ukraine and the U.S. said in a joint statement that described "meaningful progress" from the "highly productive" talks. New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani said that he still believes Trump is a "fascist" and a "despot," but he viewed their first face-to-face meeting at the White House on Friday as an "opportunity" to work together on lowering the cost of living for New Yorkers. After months…...

6+ day, 19+ hour ago (777+ words) President Donald Trump inserted fresh tensions into the high-stakes Ukraine-Russia peace talks on Sunday, publicly accusing Kyiv's leaders of showing "zero gratitude" for U.S. support just as U.S. officials in Geneva were working to show a united front. Trump's Truth Social comments landed at a delicate moment: his administration is pressing Ukraine to accept a 28-point peace proposal by Thanksgiving, even as confusion over the plan's authorship and concerns from European allies and U.S. lawmakers have raised questions about whose interests it serves. Senior U.S. officials, including Secretary of State Marco Rubio and special envoy Steve Witkoff, met with Ukrainian officials in Geneva, Switzerland, this weekend to move peace talks forward with a goal of ending the war. On Sunday, after a full day of talks, Rubio told reporters "a tremendous amount of progress," had been made. He added "there's still some work to…...