The European Union’s top diplomat accused Russia on Wednesday, December 31, of pushing “unfounded claims” that Ukraine fired drones at a residence of President Vladimir Putin, branding the allegation a “deliberate distraction” from peace efforts. “Moscow aims to derail real progress toward peace by Ukraine and its Western partners,” EU foreign affairs chief Kaja Kallas wrote on X.
Russia’s defense ministry published a video on Wednesday of a downed drone that it said Ukraine launched at President Vladimir Putin’s residence in northwest Russia this week – a claim Kyiv has branded a “lie.”
Moscow made the allegation shortly after Ukraine’s leader Volodymyr Zelensky held talks with US President Donald Trump in Florida and Kyiv has called it a “fabrication” intended to “manipulate” the peace process.
The European Union also said the video was an attempt to “derail” peace efforts. But Russia has called it a “terrorist attack” and a “personal attack” against Putin, saying it will toughen its negotiation stance in Ukraine war talks.
The video, shot at night in the dark, showed a damaged drone lying in snow in a forested area. The ministry said the alleged attack was “targeted, carefully planned and carried out in stages.” Russia has not said where Putin was at the time, claiming the attack was launched on the night of December 28-29 at Putin’s home in the Novgorod region. His residences are normally kept a close secret.
The defense ministry said the attack started around 7 pm on December 28 and was a “mass” drone launch at Putin’s residence, but said the longtime leader’s home was not damaged. It also published a video with a man it called a witness, saying he was a local villager from the settlement of Roshchino.
The US-based Institute for the Study of War (ISW), which documents the Ukraine-Russia conflict, said Tuesday it had not seen any “footage or reporting that typically follows Ukrainian deep strikes to corroborate the Kremlin’s claims of Ukrainian strikes threatening Putin’s residence in Novgorod Oblast.”
Russian officials have rallied around Putin since the claim. The Russian leader, in power since December 1999, has told Russians in recent weeks that Moscow intends to seize the rest of Ukrainian land he has proclaimed as Russian by force if diplomacy fails.
“Kremlin officials are using the alleged Ukrainian strike against Novgorod Oblast to justify Russia’s continued insistence that both Ukraine and the West capitulate to Russia’s original demands from 2021 and 2022,” the ISW said this week.