Russian Drone Strike Kills Mineworkers Hours After Zelensky Announces New Peace Talks

by Stefan J. Bos, Worthy News Europe Bureau Chief

KYIV/ABU DHABI/BUDAPEST (Worthy News) – A Russian drone strike on a bus carrying mineworkers in southeastern Ukraine killed at least 15 people on Sunday, Ukrainian officials said.

The attack came just hours after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky confirmed that a new round of U.S.-brokered peace talks with Russia would be held next week, amid growing concern over the human cost of a war in which combined military casualties on both sides are estimated to be approaching two million.

Sunday’s strike occurred in Ukraine’s Dnipropetrovsk region as workers were returning from their shift, officials said. At least seven others were injured, and the attack sparked a fire that was later extinguished, emergency services reported.

Ukraine’s largest private energy firm, DTEK, which owned the bus, said Russian forces had carried out what it described as a “large-scale terrorist attack” on its mining operations and personnel.

“The epicentre of one of the attacks was a company bus transporting miners from the enterprise after a shift,” the company said in a statement.

RUSSIAN DRONE ATTACK HITS ENERGY WORKERS

Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal condemned the strike as a deliberate assault on energy sector workers, calling it a “cynical and targeted attack.”

Zelensky also denounced the latest wave of Russian strikes, while reiterating that diplomatic efforts were continuing. Earlier Sunday, he announced that trilateral discussions involving Ukraine, Russia, and the United States will take place on February 4 and 5 in Abu Dhabi.

“Our negotiating team has just delivered a report. The dates for the next trilateral meetings have been set,” Zelensky said, adding that Ukraine was ready for a “substantive discussion” aimed at bringing the war closer to “a real and dignified end.”

Despite the renewed push for diplomacy, fighting has continued across multiple regions, with Ukraine reporting ongoing drone and missile attacks on civilian areas and key infrastructure.

Zelensky said Russia had launched nearly 1,000 attack drones over the past week, along with guided aerial bombs and missiles, in what he described as attempts to disrupt logistics and connectivity between Ukrainian cities and communities.

MOUNTING TOLL IN RELENTLESS WARFARE

The war, now nearing its fourth year since Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022, has exacted a staggering human toll.

Ukraine’s General Staff has claimed that Russia has suffered more than 1.24 million troop casualties, including killed and wounded, though such battlefield figures cannot be independently verified.

Separately, an analysis cited by the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies suggested that combined military casualties on both sides — including killed, wounded, and missing — could be approaching two million, making the conflict one of the deadliest in Europe in decades.

Amid the continuing losses, Western officials remain cautious about prospects for peace, noting that significant disagreements persist, particularly over Russian-occupied territories in eastern and southern Ukraine.

For now, Ukrainians continue to face relentless strikes, mounting hardship, and freezing winter conditions, even as negotiators prepare for another attempt to find a path toward peace.

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