Overnight state wires carried Trump's latest attacks on Zelensky, accusing him of prolonging the war, raising diesel prices, and urging Kyiv to send someone else to negotiate while explaining his refusal to add sanctions as a bid not to alienate Moscow.

By morning attention turned inward as Putin endorsed Mishustin's cabinet overhaul, with nominations sent to the Duma, nearly half the deputy premiers to be replaced and the finance minister elevated to deputy premier, a move the Kremlin then spent the day explaining.

Front-line claims of blackouts in Kyiv, a destroyed data center and a hit vessel bound for Odesa ran alongside Lavrov's meetings with Iranian officials and renewed coverage of curfews and arrests in France, which state outlets foregrounded while denying Russian involvement and, as independent outlets noted, minimizing the previous day's drone damage in St. Petersburg.