Hours before Vance and Zelenskyy were set to meet, a Russian drone with a high-explosive warhead hit the protective confinement shell of the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant in the Kyiv region, the Ukrainian president said. Radiation levels have not increased, Zelenskyy and the U.N. atomic agency said.

Hegseth urged NATO allies to bolster their defense spending from 2% to 5% of their GDP, noting that the U.S. is attempting to "revive the warrior ethos" as well.

NATO members in Europe should bear more of the costs of collective defense, US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said Thursday, echoing President Donald Trump’s call for allies to spend 5% of their GDP on defense while sidestepping suggestions that the US should hit the same target.