A Russian drone strike killed two people and wounded six others, including two children, in the Ukrainian city of Zaporizhzhia, according to regional authorities, as Russia and Ukraine traded attacks ahead of renewed US-led talks.
Ivan Fedorov, the regional head, said a man and a woman were killed when the drone hit a house. The Associated Press reported that the strike took place on Saturday and that the wounded included two children. The attacks were part of a wider exchange of fire that left at least four people dead on both sides, officials said.
The strike on Zaporizhzhia was one of several incidents that underlined how intense the war remained even as diplomacy moved back to the center of discussion. AP reported that the attacks came ahead of US-Ukraine talks in Miami. US Special Envoy Steve Witkoff described the meetings on X as “constructive” and said they were part of ongoing mediation efforts aimed at narrowing differences and moving closer to a comprehensive peace agreement.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said he had sent a delegation to the United States to push stalled peace discussions forward. The broader goal, AP said, was to restart suspended US-brokered talks and ensure that Washington continued to allow other NATO countries to buy American weapons for Ukraine. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said a new round of US-mediated negotiations between Moscow and Kyiv would likely take place soon.
The exchange of attacks showed that battlefield violence and diplomacy are still advancing in parallel. In Ukraine, the drone strike in Zaporizhzhia also came as Russian strikes cut power across much of the northern Chernihiv region, highlighting continued pressure on civilian infrastructure. In Russia, two women were killed and another wounded by Ukrainian shelling in the Belgorod border region, AP reported.
The overall pattern suggests neither side is slowing military operations while negotiations remain unresolved. AP said the talks have been on ice while the Iran war has dominated international attention, and that Russian forces continue to hold nearly one-fifth of Ukraine. Western officials have accused President Vladimir Putin of dragging out negotiations while trying to preserve battlefield momentum.
For civilians in Zaporizhzhia, the result was immediate and brutal: a home destroyed, family members dead, children injured and another reminder that even talks about peace do not halt the strikes. The AP account makes clear that the drone attack was not an isolated event but part of a larger sequence of retaliatory strikes that continue to shape the war on the ground while diplomats search for an exit.
