Ukraine allies to meet in Paris as Russian strike kills two

January 6 ------ Russian strikes on Ukraine killed two people and forced night-time evacuations into freezing temperatures, a day ahead of Ukrainian allies meeting in Paris to revive diplomatic efforts to stop the fighting.

US President Donald Trump's special envoy Steve Witkoff and son-in-law Jared Kushner will attend the Paris meeting, the latest in a US-led push to end the Russian invasion, which began four years ago next month. French President Emmanuel Macron is hosting the meeting of the so-called "coalition of the willing" on Tuesday to discuss security guarantees as part of a proposal to end the war between Ukraine and Russia.

The overnight Russian strikes triggered a fire at a private medical clinic in the capital, killing one person and wounding three others, the authorities said. Emergency services released images of rescuers removing people on stretchers from a gutted building. "Doctors and nurses were forced to evacuate the wounded under fire," Ukraine's Prime Minister Yulia Svyrydenko said on X. "It was a terrible night for us," Margaryta Maliovana, the clinic's CEO, told AFP. "One person died. A young man, 30-year-old, was killed," she said, adding that there were 26 patients in the clinic at the moment of the strike he added.

The pre-dawn attack also killed one man in his 70s in the neighbouring city of Fastiv, the Kyiv regional governor said. The strikes caused power outages in the area, with backup systems activated to maintain water and heating supplies, the official said, as temperatures dropped to -8C. Russia launched a total of 165 drones and at least nine missiles overnight, the Ukrainian air force said.

Source: kten.com