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A major Russian drone-and-missile assault struck Kyiv and Kharkiv and damaged critical infrastructure even as Russian, Ukrainian and U.S. envoys held tripartite talks in the UAE. Ukrainian officials described one of the most intense barrages in recent months, reporting civilian casualties and outages that compounded a winter energy crisis — prompting calls for an "electrical ceasefire" to spare civilians. Negotiators in Abu Dhabi described constructive progress on procedures and monitoring but left the core territorial dispute unresolved: Moscow insists on territorial concessions Kyiv rejects. The juxtaposition of intense battlefield attacks and diplomatic engagement highlights how fragile any negotiated pause remains and the difficulty of translating talks into durable protections for civilians.