内容摘要：Putin met Wednesday with senior government officials and members of the delegation in preparation for the talks, Peskov said. Defense Minister Andrei Belousov, General Staff chief Valery Gerasimov and National Security Council secretary Sergei Shoigu attended.

Putin met Wednesday with senior government officials and members of the delegation in preparation for the talks, Peskov said. Defense Minister Andrei Belousov, General Staff chief Valery Gerasimov and National Security Council secretary Sergei Shoigu attended.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov seemingly raised the stakes further this week by saying that international recognition of regions annexed from Ukraine by Russia was “imperative” for a peace deal.Achieving that remains unclear, given that dozens of countries have decried the annexations as violating international law.

Some analysts believe it is in Putin’s interest to prolong the war and keep making gains on the battlefield.Trump, Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio have threatened to wash their hands of the peace effort if there is no progress soon.Putin, in an apparent gesture of willingness to keep talking, announced this week a 72-hour ceasefire starting May 8 for Russia’s Victory Day holiday that marks the defeat of Nazi Germany in World War II.

Zelenskyy dismissed the gesture as a further attempt by Putin at “manipulation” to string along the U.S., saying a ceasefire should begin immediately and last longer.In this photo provided by Ukraine’s 93rd Kholodnyi Yar Separate Mechanized Brigade press service, a soldier looks out of a shelter on the anti-drone firing position in Kostyantynivka, the site of the heavy battles with the Russian troops in the Donetsk region, Ukraine, April 24, 2025. (Iryna Rybakova/Ukraine’s 93rd Mechanized Brigade via AP, File)

In this photo provided by Ukraine’s 93rd Kholodnyi Yar Separate Mechanized Brigade press service, a soldier looks out of a shelter on the anti-drone firing position in Kostyantynivka, the site of the heavy battles with the Russian troops in the Donetsk region, Ukraine, April 24, 2025. (Iryna Rybakova/Ukraine’s 93rd Mechanized Brigade via AP, File)

Greene noted that the Russian ruble and markets have been doing better recently over expectations of a peace deal and U.S. businesses and investors coming back, “and there may be a price to be paid” for pulling out the rug from under that.In Nasser Hospital, Safaa Al-Najjar, her face stained with blood, wept as the shroud-wrapped bodies of two of her children were brought to her: 1 1/2-year-old Motaz Al-Bayyok and 1 1/2 month-old Moaz Al-Bayyok.

The family was caught in the overnight airstrikes. All five of Al-Najjar’s other children, ranging in ages from 3 to 12, were injured, while her husband was in intensive care.One of her sons, 11-year-old Yusuf, his head heavily bandaged, screamed in grief as the shroud of his younger sibling was parted to show his face.

“I gave them dinner and put them to sleep as usual, it was a normal day. Suddenly I don’t know what happened, the world went upside down,” she said as others tried to comfort her. “I don’t know, I don’t know … what is their fault? What is their fault?”Outside the hospital, mourners gathered to pray as the dead, laid out in rows in white body bags, were loaded onto a truck to be taken for burial.