Volodymyr Zelenskyy Holds Talks in Azerbaijan on Security and Energy After Saudi Arabia Meetings

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy arrived in Azerbaijan for talks on “security and energy” after meeting leaders in Saudi Arabia, as a senior Ukrainian official told AFP and as the trip was described in multiple reports.

The Guardian said Zelenskyy arrived in Azerbaijan on Friday for talks on “security and energy,” and it framed the visit as part of Kyiv’s effort to share expertise with partners.

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DW reported that Zelenskyy said his country is ready to hold talks with Russia in Azerbaijan, after meeting Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev.

Saudi Arabia was the immediate prelude: The Guardian said Zelenskyy met Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, and it described Kyiv’s aim to share drone expertise with Gulf countries affected by the war in Iran.

In Azerbaijan, the Saudi Gazette said Zelenskyy told reporters that Kyiv is ready to hold trilateral peace talks in Azerbaijan in the near future if Russia is prepared to engage in diplomacy.

The Azerbaijan trip also included agreements: the Saudi Gazette said Zelenskyy signed six bilateral documents during the visit in several sectors, including security cooperation, and it said Aliyev and Zelenskyy discussed expanding bilateral trade “currently valued at more than $500 million.”

Zelenskyy’s messaging in the same period emphasized a strategic security arrangement across three key areas, including “exports of Ukrainian military expertise and air defence capabilities,” “energy cooperation,” and “food security,” according to The Guardian.

While Zelenskyy pursued diplomacy in Azerbaijan, the same reporting period described continued Russian attacks across Ukraine and Zelenskyy’s insistence that strikes on Russia’s oil and manufacturing targets were ongoing.

The Guardian said US weapons deliveries to Ukraine “haven’t stopped despite the Iran war,” and it added that Ukrainian long-range strikes continue to “hammer Russian oil production and manufacturing plants,” quoting Zelenskyy: “Of course, we are hitting what is painful for Russia, and it is very painful,” and adding that he said Russian losses in the strikes “have reached tens of billions of dollars.”

ABC News

It also said Russian officials reported attacks struck infrastructure “in regions more than 1,000km (600 miles) inside Russia.”

DW reported that Russian drone and missile strikes on the Ukrainian city of Dnipro killed at least five people and wounded more than 30 others on Saturday, citing local authorities and the regional head Oleksandr Ganzha.

DW also said a Russian drone hit a civilian minibus in the southern region of Zaporizhzhia, killing one person and wounding four, with Ivan Fedorov saying so on Telegram.

In the same DW account, Ukraine’s southwestern Odesa region was targeted, where Oleh Kiper said “residential buildings, port infrastructure and cars had been damaged in the south of the region.”

The Guardian’s briefing also included a separate strand of battlefield cooperation between Russia and Ukraine: it said the two countries swapped 193 captured soldiers each on Friday, the second exchange this month.

EA WorldView added more granular strike figures for the same day, saying “The Russians launched 47 missiles and 619 drones,” and it reported that “Dnipro bore the brunt of the assault” with “four bodies recovered from the rubble of a collapsed apartment block.”

Zelenskyy’s statements in Azerbaijan tied the prospect of peace talks to Russia’s willingness to engage in diplomacy, while also laying out what Kyiv said it had discussed with Ilham Aliyev.

The Saudi Gazette reported that Zelenskyy said Kyiv is ready to hold trilateral peace talks in Azerbaijan “in the near future if Russia is prepared to engage in diplomacy,” and it said he stressed the importance of Russia finding “the will to end what he described as an unjust war.”

It added that peace initiatives were among the issues discussed with Aliyev, and it said Zelenskyy valued international partners’ role in supporting mediation efforts.

DW similarly said Zelenskyy announced readiness to hold talks with Russia in Azerbaijan after meeting Aliyev, and it noted that Zelenskyy wrote on X that he began his visit by meeting a Ukrainian expert team sharing experience of protecting the skies from Russian drones and missiles.

AnewZ framed the same conditionality in a longer passage, quoting Zelenskyy’s position that “We have had negotiations in trilateral and other formats. Some took place in Türkiye, and later we met with our American partners in Geneva; we would also like to conduct our negotiations in Azerbaijan — provided that the Russian side also chooses this diplomacy.”

AnewZ also described the press statements in Gabala on April 25, with Aliyev saying cooperation between Azerbaijan and Ukraine rests on a “very strong political foundation” and citing strategic partnership agreements signed in 2008 and 2011.

In those same remarks, Aliyev said the documents reflect “mutual respect for our countries’ territorial integrity, sovereignty, and the inviolability of borders,” and he added that “Azerbaijan and Ukraine support—and will continue to support—each other’s sovereignty and territorial integrity in all international organizations.”

AnewZ also reported that Zelenskyy thanked Azerbaijan for support during the war, saying “During such a very difficult period, we received 11 aid packages from Azerbaijan,” and it said he expressed gratitude for humanitarian support for Ukrainian children, saying “More than five hundred Ukrainian children are here.”

The reporting on Zelenskyy’s Azerbaijan visit and the surrounding war context diverged in emphasis, with some outlets foregrounding diplomacy and agreements while others foregrounded strike impacts and security arrangements.

The Guardian’s briefing centered on the trip as part of a “strategic security arrangement” across three key areas, explicitly listing “exports of Ukrainian military expertise and air defence capabilities,” “energy cooperation to help Ukraine,” and “food security,” and it also tied the visit to ongoing long-range strikes and US weapons deliveries.

AnewZ

Saudi Gazette, by contrast, foregrounded the peace-talk condition and the mechanics of cooperation, saying Zelenskyy told reporters Ukraine is ready for “trilateral peace talks in Azerbaijan” if Russia engages in diplomacy, and it highlighted that “six bilateral documents were signed” and that trade was “currently valued at more than $500 million.”

DW split its account between diplomacy and immediate attack reporting, moving from Zelenskyy’s readiness to hold talks with Russia in Azerbaijan to a detailed account of Russian strikes in Dnipro, Zaporizhzhia, and Odesa, and then to a drone crash in Romania.

EA WorldView, while also discussing Zelenskyy’s talks, foregrounded a numerical strike tally, saying “The Russians launched 47 missiles and 619 drones,” and it added casualty and injury figures, including “seven civilians killed and at least 45 injured,” alongside named injured individuals such as “a 9-year-old boy, a 17-year-old girl, and two police officers.”

Even within the diplomatic narrative, AnewZ and the Guardian differed in how they framed the visit’s immediate messaging: AnewZ quoted Aliyev’s “very strong political foundation” and Zelenskyy’s “We have had negotiations in trilateral and other formats,” while The Guardian emphasized Zelenskyy’s “actively developing” arrangement and his comments about hitting “what is painful for Russia.”

The same period also included a separate internal Ukrainian governance story in The Guardian, where it said Ukraine’s defence ministry fired a top commander after photos emerged of “a group of emaciated soldiers,” and it described the wife of one soldier posting images on social media.

That governance element was not present in the Saudi Gazette or DW accounts of the Azerbaijan visit, which instead focused on peace talks, agreements, and strike impacts.

The sources portray immediate next steps as a mix of diplomacy, security cooperation, and continued war pressures, with consequences spanning captured soldiers, air defense coordination, and internal Ukrainian command changes.

The Guardian said Russia and Ukraine swapped 193 captured soldiers each on Friday, the second exchange this month, and it described the swaps as “one of the few areas of cooperation between Moscow and Kyiv,” implying that further exchanges remain possible even as other peace talks stall.

Atlantic Council

It also said Ukraine’s defence ministry fired a top commander after photos emerged of “a group of emaciated soldiers” left on the frontline for months without proper food and water, and it quoted that the brigade acknowledged logistical problems and that deliveries were only possible by air because their location was “extremely close to enemy lines.”

The Guardian added that German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said there was no prospect of Ukraine’s “immediate accession” to the EU, but it reported Merz suggested Kyiv could join meetings of the bloc’s members without voting rights, while Ukraine’s progress has been blocked by Hungary’s Viktor Orbán.

In the Azerbaijan track, the Saudi Gazette said Zelenskyy told reporters peace initiatives were among the issues discussed with Aliyev, and it reported that Aliyev said cooperation was reaffirmed and that trade was “currently valued at more than $500 million,” tying the diplomatic process to ongoing economic and energy discussions.

AnewZ added that Zelenskyy said Ukraine was ready to hold peace talks with Russia in Azerbaijan if Moscow agreed to diplomacy, and it also said Zelenskyy criticized continued Russian shelling of Ukrainian cities during the negotiations, with the report quoting: “Unfortunately, some individuals have already lost their lives today, and there are those who have been injured.”

DW’s account of the same period included a regional security spillover into Romania, where it said a drone fell in Galati and that emergency services said “A drone crashed in a populated area with a possible explosive charge,” while also noting that gas supplies were cut as a precautionary measure and that Foreign Minister Oana Toiu summoned the Russian ambassador.

Finally, The Guardian’s briefing described Zelenskyy’s claim that Russian losses from long-range strikes had reached “tens of billions of dollars,” and it said Russian officials reported attacks struck infrastructure more than 1,000km inside Russia, underscoring that the war’s scale and reach remain central to what any talks would have to address.