Russia rejects Trump’s call with Putin calling for restraint in Ukraine

The Kremlin has denied media reports that US President-elect Donald Trump held a call with Vladimir Putin in which he is said to have warned the Russian president against escalating the war in Ukraine.

The call, which was first reported by the Washington Post on Sunday, is said to have happened on Thursday.

Trump is also reported to have mentioned the extensive US military presence in Europe to Putin.

A Kremlin spokesman said the reports were “pure fiction”, while Trump’s team told the BBC they would not comment on the president-elect’s “private calls”.

Trump’s communications director Steven Cheung told the BBC: “We do not comment on private calls between President Trump and other world leaders.”

But he said leaders had begun the process of contacting the president-elect.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov denied that a conversation had taken place.

“This is completely untrue, it is pure fiction. That is, it is simply false information. There was no conversation,” Peskov said.

Trump has vowed to end the nearly three-year war in Ukraine, but has yet to outline how he intends to do so.

Zelensky has previously warned against ceding land to Russia and has said that without American help, Ukraine would lose the war.

While Peskov spoke to Russian state media on Sunday about “positive” signals from the incoming US administration, others say they trust the incoming president will not abandon Ukraine.

They include John Healey, the British defense secretary, who said he expected the US to “remain with allies like Britain and stand with Ukraine for as long as it takes to defeat Putin’s invasion”.

On Sunday, during a visit to Ukraine, EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell warned that any end to the war must be sustainable.

“This is a warning to those who say this war must end, let’s end it as soon as possible, no matter how. How important it is,” he said.

In Washington, US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said outgoing President Joe Biden would argue with Trump that walking away from Ukraine would mean greater instability in Europe.

On Monday, German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock warned that Putin could use the US transition period after the election to press Moscow’s advantage in Ukraine.

She urged Berlin and other EU member states to increase aid to Kiev, saying: “We don’t have time to wait until spring. Now is the transition phase that Putin has been waiting for and aiming for.”

A dam close to the front line in Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region was damaged on Monday, according to regional head Vadym Filashkin.

Filashkin said the Kurakhove reservoir dam was hit by a Russian attack and warned that rising waters “potentially threaten” settlements on the Vovcha River. Russia claimed Ukraine was responsible.

Last week, Russia and Ukraine launched their biggest drone strikes since the start of the war.

Russia’s Defense Ministry said it intercepted 84 Ukrainian drones over six regions, including some approaching Moscow, forcing flights to be diverted from three of the capital’s major airports.

Ukraine’s air force said Russia launched 145 drones at all parts of the country on Saturday night, most of which were shot down.

On Monday, at least six people were killed and 21 others injured in Ukraine after the latest series of airstrikes by Russia.

Russia, meanwhile, said it had destroyed 13 Ukrainian drones near the western regions of Kursk and Belgorod. It reported no deaths.

“Every day, every night, Russia unleashes the same terror,” Zelensky wrote on Twitter after Monday’s strike.

“More and more civilian sites are being targeted. Russia only wants to continue the war and each of its attacks rejects any claim of diplomacy by Russia.”

Zelensky called for “stronger global support” and more weapons to stop Russian aggression.

Elsewhere, Moscow’s Defense Ministry said its forces had captured the village of Kolisnykivka in the Kharkiv region.

Russian territorial gains in October were the biggest since March 2022, according to analysis by the Institute for the Study of War data provided by the AFP news agency.