TOP HEADLINES

· Ukraine's Russian-controlled Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant has come under fire by 15 shells but there has been no radiation leak detected, TASS reported on Sunday citing an official from Russian nuclear power operator Rosenergoatom.

· The West's attempts to persuade Ukraine to negotiate with Moscow, after a series of major military victories, are "bizarre" and amount to asking for its capitulation, a key adviser to the Ukrainian presidency. "When you have the initiative on the battlefield, it's slightly bizarre to receive proposals like: 'you will not be able to do everything by military means anyway, you need to negotiate'," said Mykhaylo Podolyak.

· Ukrainian electricity supplies are under control despite Russian attacks on power-generating infrastructure and there is no need to panic, the energy ministry said. It follows Kyiv authorities saying that it faced "complete shutdown" of the power grid as winter sets in.

· Britain's new Prime Minister Rishi Sunak made his first visit to Kyiv on Saturday, pledging to continue the firm support for Ukraine that was a focus of his predecessors, and providing a new air defence package to help shoot down Russian drones.

· Jubilant Ukrainians have rolled into Kherson by train for the first time in more than eight months as residents of the newly liberated southern city greeted them on the platform with flowers and national flags.

· Citing damage done by Russian forces, Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk announced that evacuations of people who want to leave Kherson and the surrounding areas would soon begin.

· Around 60 Russian soldiers were killed in a long-range Ukrainian artillery attack this week, Kyiv said, the second time in four days that Ukraine claimed to have inflicted major casualties in a single incident. 

· Five people were wounded in a Russian strike on a humanitarian station where bread was being distributed in the town of Bilozerka, just west of Kherson city, a senior aide to President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said.

· New Zealand said Defense Minister Peeni Henare has visited Kyiv to reaffirm the Pacific nation's support for Ukraine's resistance to Russia's invasion.

· Russia's surge in missile strikes in Ukraine is partly designed to exhaust Kyiv's supplies of air defenses and finally achieve dominance of the skies above the country, a senior Pentagon official said on Saturday.

IN DETAIL

Negotiation with Russia now would be 'bizarre' and 'capitulation' said a Zelenskyy adviser

Western attempts to persuade Ukraine to negotiate with Moscow, after a series of major military victories by Kiev, are "bizarre" and amount to asking for its capitulation, said a key adviser to the Ukrainian presidency.

"When you have the initiative on the battlefield, it's slightly bizarre to receive proposals like: 'you will not be able to do everything by military means anyway, you need to negotiate'," said Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy's adviser Mykhaylo Podolyak.

This would mean that the country "that recovers its territories, must capitulate to the country that is losing," he added, at his office in the presidency building in Kyiv.

U.S. media recently reported that some senior officials were beginning to encourage Ukraine to consider talks, which Zelenskyy has so far rejected without a prior withdrawal of Russian forces from all Ukrainian territory.

"There has to be a mutual recognition that military victory is probably in the true sense of the word maybe not achievable through military means," top U.S. General Mark Milley said earlier this month, estimating that there is "a window of opportunity for negotiation."

According to Podolyak, Moscow has not made "any direct proposal" to Kyiv for peace talks, preferring to transmit them through intermediaries and even raising the possibility of a ceasefire.

Kyiv sees such talk as mere manoeuvring by the Kremlin to win some respite on the ground and prepare a new offensive.

"Russia doesn't want negotiations. Russia is conducting a communication campaign called 'negotiations'," the Ukraine presidential adviser said.

"It will simply stall for time. In the meantime, it will train its mobilised forces, find additional weapons and fortify its positions," he warned.