Macron and Merz call Russia's record 1,500-drone Kyiv barrage a rejection of peace talks
French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Friedrich Merz condemned Russia's overnight strike on Kyiv — nearly 1,500 drones and missiles, the largest 24-hour barrage of the war — as a deliberate rejection of the peace process. Macron called the attack 'hypocritical' so soon after the May 9-11 ceasefire and said Moscow was 'bombing civilians' because it 'is running out of solutions on the military front.' Merz, speaking at the Charlemagne Prize ceremony in Aachen, said the strikes 'speak a different language' than negotiation, and rebuffed a Kremlin offer to deal with Europe only if former Chancellor Gerhard Schröder represented the bloc.
French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Friedrich Merz on Thursday condemned Russia's overnight assault on Ukraine, an attack Macron said totalled nearly 1,500 drones and missiles over a 24-hour window — the largest such barrage in the four years of the war.
Macron, writing on X, said the strike "lays bare all the hypocrisy" with which Moscow had negotiated the May 9-11 ceasefire days earlier. "By bombing civilians, Russia demonstrates less its strength than its weakness: It is running out of solutions on the military front and does not know how to end its war of aggression," he wrote. He added that Paris was working toward "a just and lasting peace for Ukraine, one that guarantees its security and that of Europe."
Merz delivered his response from Aachen, where he was attending the awards ceremony for the International Charlemagne Prize 2026. "We want to help bring this terrible war to an end as soon as possible," he said. "But the attacks of last night speak a different language. The will to negotiate requires willingness to negotiate on both sides." He rebuffed a Kremlin proposal to engage the European Union only through Gerhard Schröder, the pro-Kremlin former German chancellor: "We Europeans decide for ourselves who speaks for us, no one else does."
The condemnations landed against a specific diplomatic backdrop. Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha said Russia had launched the attack "right at the time when the leaders of the most powerful countries meet in Beijing and the world hopes for peace, predictability, and cooperation." A missile toppled a residential building in central Kyiv overnight, with explosions registered across the city through the night. The previous day's daytime salvo struck Uzhhorod, on Ukraine's border with Hungary, for the first time since the 2022 invasion — prompting Budapest to summon the Russian ambassador, also a first of the full-scale war.
The exchange follows a May 7 decision by Paris, Berlin and the European Commission to keep their embassies in Kyiv open despite an explicit Russian threat to strike "decision-making centres" if Ukraine disrupted Moscow's May 9 commemorations. Washington and Moscow are simultaneously talking past each other: US President Donald Trump said this week he believes the war's end is "very close," while the Kremlin reiterated that any negotiation requires Kyiv to first withdraw from Donbas territory Russian forces have not been able to take.