Starmer hosts Zelensky, Macron and Merz; Russian strikes hit nuclear site, kill 3 in Ukraine

LONDON — Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky insisted Sunday that Europe must play a key role in any negotiations to end the war with Russia as he arrived for talks in London with staunch European allies in the wake of a Russian drone strike that killed three people.

The meeting came as a Russian drone strike damaged a nuclear storage site in Ukraine less than 10 miles from the Chernobyl nuclear plant, which the U.N. atomic watchdog’s chief called “deeply concerning.”

Ahead of the meeting hosted by British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, Zelensky said the talks would focus on further efforts to help Ukraine’s war effort, including air defense.

“Europe must be part of the negotiations and must be strong,” he said on X.

Also present at the meeting at 10 Downing St. were French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Friedrich Merz. Macron and Merz left after a couple of hours of discussions, leaving Starmer to continue talks with Zelensky.

The U.K., France and Germany — the so-called E3 group of European nations — have been prominent backers of Ukraine following Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022. The U.K. and France lead the “coalition of the willing” initiative to provide security guarantees for Ukraine as part of a peace process.

The meeting comes in the wake of a Russian drone strike that killed three people waiting at a bus stop in southeastern Ukraine. Another person was wounded in the drone attack in Balabyne in Ukraine’s southern Zaporizhzhia region, the head of the regional military administration, Ivan Fedorov, wrote on his Telegram channel.

A separate drone strike damaged a storage center for spent nuclear fuel in the Kyiv region, just nine miles from the decommissioned Chernobyl nuclear power plant, Ukraine’s General Staff said. The attack sparked a fire that was extinguished within an hour. Radiation remains within safe levels, officials said.

The International Atomic Energy Agency chief, Rafael Mariano Grossi, said the incident was “deeply concerning” due to the large amounts of nuclear material held at the facility. He said in a statement that the agency would visit the site of the attack soon.

Elsewhere, a Ukrainian attack killed one man and injured a woman in Russia’s Kursk region, local Gov. Alexander Khinshtein said.

The Russian attacks follow a large-scale Ukrainian drone attack Saturday that targeted St. Petersburg, Russia’s second-largest city, illustrating Kyiv’s growing ability to hit deep inside Russia.

With the front line barely moving as swarms of drones hinder advances, both sides have sought an edge by launching long-range strikes. The war that followed Russia’s invasion of its neighbor is more than four years old, with no end in sight.

The St. Petersburg attack, which came less than 24 hours after the end of the city’s flagship economic forum headed by President Vladimir Putin, was a blow to his efforts to cast the conflict as a distant event that doesn’t affect Russian daily life.

Pylas writes for the Associated Press. AP writer Katie Marie Davies in Manchester, England, contributed to this report.