By JAMEY KEATEN and ILLIA NOVIKOV

GENEVA (AP) — The latest U.S.-brokered talks between envoys from Moscow and Kyiv over Russia’s all-out invasion of Ukraine ended Wednesday with no sign of a breakthrough and with both sides saying the talks were “difficult,” as the war’s fourth anniversary approaches next week.

The negotiations in Switzerland were the third round of direct talks organized by the U.S., after meetings earlier this year in Abu Dhabi that officials described as constructive but which also made no major headway. Expectations for significant progress in Geneva were low.

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“The negotiations were not easy,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said after the talks broke up and he spoke briefly by phone from Kyiv with his negotiating team.

He earlier accused Russia of “trying to drag out negotiations” while it presses on with its invasion — an accusation he and European leaders have repeatedly made in the past.

Despite that, some progress was made on military issues although political differences remain deep, including over the future of land in eastern Ukraine that is occupied by the Russian army and that Russian President Vladimir Putin wants to keep, Zelenskyy said.

The head of the Russian delegation, Putin adviser Vladimir Medinsky, told reporters that the two days of talks in Geneva “were difficult but businesslike.”

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters that it’s “too early” to speak about the outcome of the talks. Putin has been receiving reports about progress in Geneva, he said.

Both sides said a new round of talks is set to take place.

US will help monitor any ceasefire

Zelenskyy described the military discussions as “constructive,” adding that the armed forces of both countries considered how any future ceasefire might be monitored.

“Monitoring will definitely be carried out with participation of the American side,” he said in a voice message shared in a media group chat on WhatsApp.

U.S. President Donald Trump’s envoy, Steve Witkoff, said on social media that Washington’s push for peace in Ukraine over the past year has “brought about meaningful progress,” without elaborating.

The two armies remain locked in battle on the roughly 750-mile front line, while Russia bombards civilian areas of Ukraine daily.

Hours after the first day of talks ended on Tuesday, Russian drones killed a woman and injured a 6-year-old girl and 18-month-old toddler in the southern Ukraine city of Zaporizhzhia, officials said.

Overnight, Russia launched one ballistic missile and 126 long-range drones at Ukraine, according to the Ukrainian air force.

Europe is involved

Zelenskyy said that the Ukrainian and American envoys in Geneva met with representatives from the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Italy and Switzerland.

Europe’s participation in the process is “indispensable,” Zelenskyy said.

In this photo provided by Ukraine’s 93rd Kholodnyi Yar Separate Mechanized Brigade press service, soldiers control an FPV drone to send food to fellow-soldiers on a mission on the frontline near Kostyantynivka, Donetsk region, Ukraine, Tuesday, Feb. 17, 2026. (Iryna Rybakova/Ukraine’s 93rd Mechanized Brigade via AP)

European leaders, mindful of Putin’s wider ambitions, say their own security is at stake in Ukraine and have insisted on being consulted in peace efforts.

Russia and Ukraine appear to still be far apart on their demands for a settlement.

Zelenskyy has offered a ceasefire and a face-to-face meeting with Putin. But Moscow wants a comprehensive agreement before committing to a truce.

Putin’s key goals remain what he declared when Russia invaded its neighbor on Feb. 24, 2022: Ukraine must renounce joining NATO, sharply reduce the size of its army and protect Russian language and culture to keep the country in Moscow’s orbit.

Additionally, Putin wants Kyiv to withdraw its forces from the four eastern regions Moscow has occupied but doesn’t fully control.

Zelenskyy says Ukraine won’t surrender land to Russia.

Novikov reported from Kyiv, Ukraine.

Follow AP’s coverage of the war in Ukraine at https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine

Lake Alice in William O’Brien State Park, which virtually disappeared in August after a dam valve failed and the water drained into the St. Croix River, will remain empty until the fall of 2027, Minnesota Department of Natural Resources officials said Tuesday.

DNR officials plan to replace Lake Alice’s 65-year-old water-control structure, which manages water levels within the spring-fed, manmade lake in northern Washington County, by releasing water from the lake through a culvert into the St. Croix River.

“We determined a total replacement is the most cost-effective, sustainable and long-term solution for maintaining the park’s natural resources and recreation opportunities,” said Laurel Quill, the agency’s Central Region Parks and Trails manager.

The $325,000 project also includes dredging the St. Croix River at William O’Brien’s public-water access to remove sediment deposited around the access during the drawdown, she said.

Park staff in July partially opened the valve of the structure after heavy rain caused water levels to overflow the lake’s earthen dike, raising erosion concerns.

On Aug. 8, staff opened the valve further to address ongoing water-level concerns, DNR officials said. Having successfully addressed the high water levels, staff attempted to close the valve the following day.

“It was at this point that staff discovered the closure mechanism had failed and the valve was stuck open, resulting in the near total water-level drawdown,” DNR officials said at the time.

DNR officials plan this summer to apply for permits and undertake land and archaeological surveys, and other natural resource work field work. The water control structure construction and public-water access dredging is scheduled to begin in the spring of 2027; the project is expected to be completed in the fall of 2027, Quill said.

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Public recreation on Lake Alice will not be available until the project is completed.

The park’s public water access to the St. Croix at the Walter F. Mondale Day Use Area will be open, as water levels allow, throughout the year. Visitors should check the William O’Brien State Park (mndnr.gov/Obrien) website for updates before going to the park, Quill said.

“We’re thankful for the public’s continued patience as we tackle this challenge,” she said. “We look forward to welcoming visitors back to a Lake Alice that has a modernized infrastructure that makes the lake more resilient for the future.”

By LINLEY SANDERS

WASHINGTON (AP) — Democratic candidates have notched a series of wins in recent special elections — but a new AP-NORC poll finds views of the Democratic Party among rank-and-file Democrats have not bounced back since President Donald Trump’s victory in 2024.

Only about 7 in 10 Democrats have a positive view of the Democratic Party, according to new polling from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. While the overwhelming majority of Democrats still feel good about their party, they’re much less positive than they’ve been in the past.

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The midterm elections are still many months away, and lackluster favorability doesn’t spell electoral doom. Other factors could benefit Democrats this year, including broadly negative views of Trump and other Republicans. Additionally, recent polling has found that independents tend to identify more with the party that’s out of power, which could boost Democrats this year too. Historically, the party not in the White House has picked up seats in Congress in midterm elections.

But the lack of enthusiasm could be a longer-term problem for the party. Democrats’ favorability of their party plummeted after the 2024 election, from 85% in September 2024 to 67% in October 2025. And despite overwhelming victories in November’s off-season elections and a string of wins since then, those views haven’t recovered. Other polling indicates that Democrats are deeply frustrated with their party.

At the same time, there’s some potential good news for Democrats in the new poll. Although Republicans are slightly more enthusiastic about their own party, Americans in general don’t think highly of either party. Health care is on many Americans’ minds this year, and it’s an issue where Democrats have a large advantage, according to the survey. Meanwhile, Republicans have lost some ground on two of Trump’s signature issues, the economy and immigration, although Americans don’t necessarily trust Democrats more on those issues as a result.

Many Democrats are frustrated

FILE – Part of the stage with the DNC logo is seen at the Democratic National Convention Thursday, Aug. 22, 2024, in Chicago. (AP Photo/Brynn Anderson, File)

Other polling suggests that Democrats’ post-2024 slump is unusually large.

In Gallup’s measure of favorability, Democrats’ positive views of their own party declined about 12 percentage points in the last year. That marked the lowest measure in that question’s history, which dates back to 2001. Notably, Democrats did not see a similar decline after their first loss to Trump in 2016.

That diminished view of the Democratic Party in the AP-NORC polling is consistent regardless of Democrats’ age, race, ideology or educational background — suggesting that appealing to a specific group or two won’t fix the problem.

A separate survey from the Pew Research Center last fall found roughly two-thirds of Democrats in September said their own party made them “frustrated” compared to just 4 in 10 Republicans.

Among those frustrated Democrats, about 4 in 10 felt their party was not fighting hard enough against Trump while about 1 in 10 said there was a lack of good leadership or a cohesive agenda.

Many Americans are negative about both parties

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., stepped off the Senate floor, Friday evening, Jan. 30, 2026, at the Capitol in Washington. The Senate voted Friday to fund most of the government through the end of September after President Donald Trump made a deal with Democrats to carve out Homeland Security funding and allow Congress to debate new restrictions on federal immigration raids across the country. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)

It’s not just Democrats — Americans aren’t thrilled with either party right now.

Roughly one-quarter of Americans have a negative view of both the Democratic Party and the Republican Party, according to the AP-NORC data. That double-negativity is especially sharp among independents and Americans under 45.

About half of U.S. adults only view one party positively, and only about 1 in 10 feel good about both parties.

But Democrats’ loss of goodwill is more recent. Polling over the last 25 years from Gallup shows that Americans used to feel much more positively toward the Democrats. Around 2010, public sentiment turned against the Democrats. Since then, at least half of Americans have held unfavorable views of the party, according to Gallup.

Negative views of the Democrats now rival the most negative points in time for the Republicans.

Democrats hold health care as a strength

FILE – A podium is prepared before Democrats hold news conference on the health care funding fight on the steps of the House before votes to end the government shutdown on Capitol Hill, Nov. 12, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Mariam Zuhaib, File)

With health care at the top of Americans’ priority lists as costs and premiums rise, Democrats have a possible advantage going into the midterm year.

About one-third of U.S. adults — 35% — trust the Democrats to do a better job handling health care, compared to 23% for the Republicans. That is broadly in line with the last time the question was asked in October 2025.

FILE – People stand outside the Democratic National Committee headquarters in Washington, June 14, 2016. (AP Photo/Paul Holston, File)

At the same time, Republicans have lost some ground on the issues that were key to Trump’s reelection — the economy and immigration. But Democrats haven’t managed to capitalize on it. Only about 3 in 10 U.S. adults, 31%, say Republicans are the party they trust to handle the economy, down slightly from 36% last year. But Democrats haven’t made any gains on this issue; rather, slightly more Americans now say they trust “neither” party to handle the economy.

Neither party has an edge on who is better equipped to manage the cost of living, which was first asked in the most recent poll.

Republicans are also down slightly on handling immigration. Only about one-third of U.S. adults trust them to better handle immigration, an apparent decrease from 39% in October. Democrats didn’t appear to benefit from that shift either.

The AP-NORC poll of 1,156 adults was conducted Feb. 5-8 using a sample drawn from NORC’s probability-based AmeriSpeak Panel, which is designed to be representative of the U.S. population. The margin of sampling error for adults overall is plus or minus 3.9 percentage points. The margin of sampling error for Democrats overall is plus or minus 6.0 percentage points.

By DAVID BAUDER

Stephen Colbert isn’t backing down in an extraordinary public dispute with his bosses at CBS over what he can air on his late-night talk show.

On “The Late Show” Tuesday, Colbert said he was surprised by a statement from CBS denying that its lawyers told him he couldn’t show an interview with Democratic Texas Senate candidate James Talarico — which the host said had happened the night before.

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He then took a copy of the network statement, wrapped it in a dog poop bag, and tossed it away.

Colbert had instead shown his Talarico interview on YouTube, but told viewers why he couldn’t show it on CBS. The network was concerned about FCC Chairman Brendan Carr trying to enforce a rule that required broadcasters to give “equal time” to opposing candidates when an interview was broadcast with one of them.

“We looked and we can’t find one example of this rule being enforced for any talk show interview, not only for my entire late-night career, but for anyone’s late-night career going back to the 1960s,” Colbert said.

Although Carr said in January he was thinking about getting rid of the exemption for late-night talk shows, he hadn’t done it yet. “But CBS generously did it for him,” Colbert said.

Not only had CBS been aware Monday night that Colbert was going to talk about this issue publicly, its lawyers had even approved it in his script, he said. That’s why he was surprised by the statement, which said that Colbert had been provided “legal guidance” that broadcasting the interview could trigger the equal time rule.

“I don’t know what this is about,” Colbert said. “For the record, I’m not even mad. I really don’t want an adversarial relationship with the network. I’ve never had one.”

He said he was “just so surprised that this giant global corporation would not stand up to these bullies.” CBS is owned by Paramount Global.

Colbert is a short-timer now at CBS. The network announced last summer that Colbert’s show, where President Donald Trump is a frequent target of biting jokes, would end in May. The network said it was for economic reasons but others — including Colbert — have expressed skepticism that Trump’s repeated criticism of the show had nothing to do with it.

This week’s dispute with Colbert also recalls last fall, when ABC took late-night host Jimmy Kimmel off the air for a remark made about the killing of conservative activist founder Charlie Kirk, only to reinstate him following a backlash by viewers.

As of Wednesday morning, Colbert’s YouTube interview with Talarico had been viewed more than 5 million times, or roughly double what the comic’s CBS program draws each night.

David Bauder writes about the intersection of media and entertainment for the AP. Follow him at http://x.com/dbauder and https://bsky.app/profile/dbauder.bsky.social.