The United States will know in a matter of weeks if Russia is serious about peace with Ukraine, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio has said, after European allies accused Russia of stalling over the Trump administration's call for a ceasefire.
US President Donald Trump, who has promised to bring a quick end to the three-year-old war, has for weeks said he believes Russia's Vladimir Putin is committed to peace.
Sources have said that the White House has grown wary of Mr Putin's intentions in recent days, although Mr Trump continues to signal publicly his belief that Mr Putin wants to end the war.
"We will know soon enough, in a matter of weeks, not months, whether Russia is serious about peace or not. I hope they are," Mr Rubio said at the end of a two-day NATO meeting.
"If this is dragging things out, President Trump's not going to fall into the trap of endless negotiations about negotiations," Mr Rubio said.
"We're testing to see if the Russians are interested in peace. Their actions - not their words, their actions - will determine whether they're serious or not, and we intend to find that out sooner rather than later."
Russia rejected a US proposal in March for a full 30-day ceasefire after Ukraine said it would agree.
The warring sides then agreed to a limited pause in attacks on each other's energy infrastructure, which both accuse the other of violating. Washington says it is still in talks with both sides.
European nations call on Russia to commit to ceasefire
European allies want the US to demand Russia prove it is serious by signing up to a ceasefire, with some suggesting that an explicit deadline should be set.
Russia "owes an answer to the United States" which had "worked very hard to come up with a mediation effort and a ceasefire proposal," French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot said.
British Foreign Minister David Lammy said Mr Putin "continues to obfuscate, continues to drag his feet".
"He could accept a ceasefire now, he continues to bombard Ukraine, its civilian population, its energy supplies. We see you, Vladimir Putin, we know what you are doing," Mr Lammy said.
German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock said Mr Putin's talk of negotiations was "nothing but empty promises" and the Russian leader was "playing for time by raising ever new demands".
The foreign ministers of Canada and Estonia were among those calling for timelines for Russia to accept a ceasefire.
A senior US State Department official said late last night that there was not necessarily a consensus on a timeline for increasing pressure on Russia, but there was a recognition that "the sooner the better".
"There was consensus that Russia needs to do more, that Russia should agree to a ceasefire."
European faith in the US as the continent's ultimate protector against any attack from Russia has been shaken over the past months by Mr Trump's outreach to Moscow.
Asked whether ministers got reassurances from Mr Rubio that the US will not make concessions to Russia that would be bad for European interests, Norwegian Foreign Minister Espen Barth Eide said: "I felt that the room had a broad agreement on where the red lines are."
Asked the same question, a senior European diplomat said: "I would say that he (Rubio) said all the right things. But the point is whether there is enough trust left between the US and its allies."
Russian drone strikes kill two, injure dozens in Kharkiv, authorities say
At least two people were killed and dozens injured during Russian drone strikes on the eastern Ukrainian city of Kharkiv, Ukrainian authorities said.
Russia and Ukraine have stepped up aerial attacks even as US President Donald Trump pushes them to agree to a ceasefire after more than three years of fighting.
The attack targeted residential and office buildings in Kharkiv, causing several fires and leaving 35 people injured, including a child, Ukraine's state emergency service said on Telegram.
"Russian drones attacked one of the districts of Kharkiv. As a result of strikes at residential buildings and an administrative building, four fires broke out," the emergency service said.
Five other people were injured in the Ukrainian regions of Dnipro, Zaporizhzhia and Kyiv, according to local authorities.
Ukraine, meanwhile, called on the US to strengthen sanctions on Russia for "violating" agreements made at talks in Saudi Arabia last month.
Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky said Russia was intentionally attacking Ukrainian energy infrastructure.
Separately, a Russian ballistic missile strike killed at least four people in Mr Zelensky's home city of Kryvyi Rig.
One person was also killed and another was injured in a Ukrainian drone attack on Russia's Bryansk region, the local governor said.
Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin said earlier that Russian air defence units had brought down a drone approaching the capital.
"Air defence units of the Defence Ministry repelled an attack by a drone flying towards Moscow," Mr Sobyanin wrote on Telegram.
"Emergency specialists are working at the site where fragments have fallen."
A representative of Rosaviatsiya, the federal transport agency, said that the capital's Vnukovo, Domodedovo and Zhukovsky airports had been ordered to temporarily close. They were reopened for departing flights several hours later.
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