Steve Rosenberg: Lasting image of Russia's economic forum is plume of smoke over St Petersburg

An evil sorcerer is the last person you'd expect to see at an economic forum.

With sleight of hand Russian folklore villain "Koshchei the Deathless" (or, rather, someone dressed as him) produced coins out of thin air, "broke" and reassembled someone's glasses and shocked passers-by with occasional puffs of smoke from his fingers.

"Russians are unpredictable people," he declared. "We do things no one expects."

But in St Petersburg this week, the unexpected was delivered most dramatically by Ukraine.

Ukrainian drones attacked the St Petersburg area on the opening – and closing – days of the set-piece International Economic Forum (SPIEF).

The abiding image of SPIEF 2026 will be the huge plume of thick black smoke which dominated the St Petersburg skyline on Wednesday. Without specifying what was hit, local officials admitted that drones had damaged "infrastructure". All the delegates saw the smoke as they arrived at the expo centre on the edge of the city.

Volodymyr Zelensky published an open letter to Vladimir Putin. Ukraine's president taunted Russia's leader about his age and about Russian setbacks in the war but proposed the two leaders meet in a neutral country to talk peace.

The Kremlin leader, who had rejected previous calls for direct talks with President Zelensky, criticised the letter's "rude" tone and dismissed the offer .