Vladimir Putin

United States President Donald Trump threatened to impose “very severe tariffs” on Russia on Monday if a peace agreement to end the Ukraine war is not reached in the next 50 days.

Trump has also unveiled a new agreement to supply Ukraine with more weapons.

On the campaign trail ahead of last year’s presidential election, Trump boasted that he would end the war in Ukraine within his first 24 hours in office.

However, after at least six phone conversations between Trump and his Russian counterpart, President Vladimir Putin, as well as several meetings between US officials and officials from Russia and Ukraine, no ceasefire deal has been reached.

In May, Putin refused to travel to Istanbul to meet with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy for peace talks. The two countries sent delegations instead, resulting in prisoner exchange agreements, only.

So, will Trump’s latest threat convince Russian President Vladimir Putin to change his stance on Ukraine?

What did Trump say about Russia and Ukraine this week?

Weapons for Ukraine

At a meeting with NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte in the Oval Office on Monday, Trump said he was “disappointed” in Putin and that Ukraine would receive billions of dollars’ worth of US weapons.

“We’re going to make top-of-the-line weapons, and they’ll be sent to NATO,” Trump said, adding that NATO would pay for them. He added that this would include the Patriot air defence missiles that Ukraine has sought urgently.

“We have one country that has 17 Patriots getting ready to be shipped … We’re going to work a deal where the 17 will go, or a big portion of the 17 will go to the war site,” Trump said.

New tariffs for Russian goods

Trump said if Putin fails to sign a peace deal with Ukraine within 50 days of Monday this week, he will impose “very severe” trade tariffs on Russia, as well as secondary tariffs on other countries.

“We’re going to be doing secondary tariffs,” Trump said. “If we don’t have a deal in 50 days, it’s very simple, and they’ll be at 100 percent.”

Since the start of the Ukraine war, the US and its allies have imposed at least 21,692 separate sanctions on Russian individuals, media organisations and institutions, targeting sectors including the military, energy, aviation, shipbuilding and telecommunications.

While the trade relationship between US and Russia might be relatively marginal, “secondary tariffs” – first threatened by Trump in March but not implemented – would affect countries such as India and China purchasing Russian oil.

In 2024, Russian oil made up 35 percent of India’s total crude imports and 19 percent of China’s oil imports. Turkiye also relies heavily on Russian oil, sourcing up to 58 percent of its refined petroleum imports from Russia in 2023.

Some Western countries could also be hit by secondary tariffs. In 2024, European countries spent more than $700m on Russian uranium products, according to an analysis by the Brussels-based think tank Bruegel, which used data from the European Union’s statistical office, Eurostat.

How has Russia responded to Trump’s latest threats?

Putin has not responded personally.

However, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told reporters on Tuesday: “The US president’s statements are very serious. Some of them are addressed personally to President Putin. We certainly need time to analyse what was said in Washington.”

Peskov stated, however, that decisions made in Washington and other NATO countries were “perceived by the Ukrainian side not as a signal for peace, but as a signal to continue the war”.

Dmitry Medvedev, former Russian president and current deputy chair of Russia’s Security Council, wrote in an X post on Tuesday that Russia did not care about Trump’s “theatrical ultimatum”.

Trump issued a theatrical ultimatum to the Kremlin.
The world shuddered, expecting the consequences.
Belligerent Europe was disappointed.
Russia didn’t care.

— Dmitry Medvedev (@MedvedevRussiaE) July 15, 2025

Sergei Ryabkov, a senior Russian diplomat, said on Tuesday: “We first and foremost note that any attempts to make demands – especially ultimatums – are unacceptable for us,” Russia’s TASS news agency reported.

The Russian stock market appeared untroubled by Trump’s threat, rising 2.7 percent on Monday, according to the Moscow Stock Exchange.

The Russian rouble initially lost value against the US dollar but then recovered after Trump threatened new tariffs on Russia. According to data from financial analysis group LSEG, the rouble was just 0.2 percent weaker at the end of the day, trading at 78.10 to the US dollar after weakening to 78.75 earlier in the day.

The rouble gained 0.9 percent to 10.87 against the Chinese yuan, the most traded foreign currency in Russia. This was after it had weakened by more than 1 percent on Friday.

Will US weapons help Ukraine significantly?

Marina Miron, a postdoctoral researcher at the defence studies department at King’s College London, told Al Jazeera that the Patriot missile systems that Trump has pledged to sell to Ukraine are long-range air defences best suited for shooting down ballistic missiles such as Russia’s Iskander M.

“But Ukraine will need short- to medium-range systems as well as multiple rocket launchers in order to defend itself. So it’s more of a political move for Trump rather than anything else,” Miron said.

She added that the significance of these weapons depends on several factors, including whether Ukraine will get 17 systems as allegedly promised, and where the systems would be placed.

How has Trump changed his stance on aiding Ukraine?

A month into his presidential term, Trump posted on his Truth Social platform, blaming Zelenskyy for continuing the war with Russia and saying the Ukrainian president “talked the United States of America into spending $350 Billion Dollars, to go into a War that couldn’t be won, that never had to start”.

The US has sent Ukraine about $134bn in aid so far – not $350bn – according to the Kiel Institute for the World Economy.

Trump’s MAGA (Make America Great Again) base has also been critical of US funding for Ukraine.

In early July, the Trump administration announced a decision to “pause” arms deliveries to Kyiv, but reversed this a week later. When Trump announced the reversal on July 8, his supporters voiced criticism.

Derrick Evans, one of Trump’s supporters who was among the throng which stormed the US Capitol on January 6, 2021, and who was later arrested but then pardoned by Trump in January this year, wrote on X: “I did not vote for this.” Conservative social media duo Keith and Kevin Hodge posted on X: “Who in the hell is telling Trump that we need to send more weapons to Ukraine?”

Trump appears to be attempting to address these criticisms by saying that instead of supplying weapons to Ukraine, he will sell them to NATO.

Furthermore, Miron said, the US is not losing anything by selling weapons, since NATO will be paying for them. “There are not enough systems being provided to make a substantial difference,” she said.

Could Trump’s latest threats force Putin to change his policy?

While Putin has repeatedly voiced his determination to achieve his war aims, he has not specifically stated what they are. Broadly, he has sought territorial gains within Ukraine and has opposed Ukraine’s membership in NATO – these have not changed and are unlikely to do so, according to observers.

“If you were to describe Russia’s approach, it’s ‘keep calm and carry on,’” Miron said, referring to the fact that most Russian officials have not responded to Trump’s threat.

“So they are not going for this informational trap,” she said.

Has Putin changed his stance at all since Russia invaded Ukraine?

Miron said Putin has expanded his goals since Ukraine’s major cross-border incursion to the Kursk region in August last year. Ukraine’s push into Kursk, which took the Kremlin by surprise, marked the most significant Ukrainian attack inside Russian territory since the war began.

In May this year, Russian troops were tasked with establishing a buffer zone stretching up to 10km (6 miles) into Ukraine’s Dnipropetrovsk Oblast, according to Ukraine’s military intelligence chief Kyrylo Budanov, in an interview with Bloomberg published on July 11.

“I have already said that a decision was made to create the necessary security buffer zone along the border. Our armed forces are currently solving this problem. Enemy firing points are being actively suppressed, the work is under way,” Putin said back then.

While Putin did not provide much detail about what the buffer zones would entail, Russian General Viktor Sobolev said they would allow Russia to push Ukraine’s long-range missiles out of striking range, Ukrainian media reported.

Here are the key events on day 1,238 of Russia’s war on Ukraine.

Here is how things stand on Wednesday, July 16:

Fighting

• A Russian attack on the Kupiansk district in Ukraine’s Kharkiv region killed two people in their late 60s and injured two others, the regional prosecutor’s office said on social media.
• A Russian artillery attack on the outskirts of the Velykopysarivska community in Ukraine’s Sumy region killed a 50-year-old resident, regional authorities said.
• The Russian Ministry of Defence said its troops had occupied the villages of Voskresenka and Petrivka in Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region.
• A Ukrainian drone attack on Russia’s western city of Voronezh wounded 27 people, local officials said. The city’s mayor, Sergei Petrin, said a kindergarten was damaged and children were being temporarily transferred to neighbouring facilities.
• Russian air defence units destroyed 12 Ukrainian drones over the Voronezh region, Governor Alexander Gusev said on Telegram.
• A drone crashed in an industrial zone in Russia’s Yelets city in the Lipetsk region, injuring one person, regional Governor Igor Artamonov said on Telegram.
• The governor of Russia’s Bryansk region, Alexander Bogomaz, said a woman was injured in a drone attack on the village of Sluchevsk.
• The Russian Defence Ministry said on Telegram that its air defence units destroyed 55 Ukrainian drones overnight across five Russian regions and the Black Sea.

Politics and diplomacy

• United States President Donald Trump told reporters at the White House that Ukraine “shouldn’t target” the Russian capital Moscow, and that he was “on nobody’s side…I want to stop the killing”.
• Senior Russian security official Dmitry Medvedev dismissed what he described as Trump’s “theatrical” 50-day “ultimatum” for the Kremlin to end its war on Ukraine after the US president announced a deal to supply more weapons to Kyiv via NATO, and threatened tariffs on Russia.
• Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told reporters that Trump’s remarks on Monday were “very serious”, adding that “some of them are addressed personally to President Putin”.
• Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni said that the US president’s “change of posture” towards Russia was “obviously welcome”.
• Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal announced his resignation a day after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said he was offering the job to Deputy Prime Minister Yulia Svyrydenko. Shmyhal is expected to become Ukraine’s defence minister.
• The European Union did not approve a new round of sanctions on Russia after Slovakia requested a delay in the vote.
• The European Council has imposed sanctions on an additional five individuals “responsible for serious violations or abuses of human rights and for the repression of civil society and democratic opposition in Russia”.
• US citizen Daniel Martindale, who lived in Ukraine and passed information to pro-Russian forces that helped to target Ukrainian troops, has received a Russian passport in Moscow.

Weapons

• Several countries, including Denmark, the Netherlands and Sweden, said they would take part in the US scheme for NATO member states to buy US weapons for use by Ukraine.
• Prime Minister Petr Fiala has said the Czech Republic would not participate in the NATO weapons purchase plan, adding that his country is focused “on other projects and paths” to help Ukraine, including “through the ammunition initiative”.

The Kremlin has said that US President Donald Trump’s recent statements, including a threat to impose sanctions on Russia’s trading partners, are serious and require time to assess.

Amid growing frustration with Russian President Vladimir Putin, Trump on Monday announced new deliveries of weapons, including Patriot missile systems, to Ukraine via NATO and said that buyers of Russian exports could face severe tariffs if Moscow fails to agree to a peace deal within 50 days, signalling a major policy shift in Washington.

“The US president’s statements are very serious. Some of them are addressed personally to President Putin,” Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told reporters in Moscow on Tuesday.

“We certainly need time to analyse what was said in Washington. And if and when President Putin deems it necessary, he will definitely comment.”

Former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev mocked Trump’s announcement, calling it a “theatrical ultimatum” and saying that “Russia didn’t care”. Medvedev, who now serves as deputy chair of Russia’s Security Council, has frequently issued strident remarks throughout the war.

Russian Senator Konstantin Kosachev was similarly dismissive. Writing on Telegram, he said Trump’s announcement would have no impact on public sentiment in Russia and claimed the United States was setting a trap for Europe — forcing NATO states to pay for weapons that would primarily benefit the US arms industry.

“Only the American military-industrial complex will profit from this,” Kosachev said.

Olesia Horiainova, co-founder of the Ukrainian Security and Cooperation Center, expressed hope that the US would continue to sell weaponry to Ukraine and called for “harsher” sanctions on Russia, which, she said, “is showing no signs of being interested” in “stopping the war”.

She told Al Jazeera that US sanctions on purchasers of Russian oil could have a major impact on Russia’s economy.

“Every dollar that is put into Russia’s economy right now is being spent on the war – so, yes, if the sanctions will be imposed eventually on Russia in 50 days, or earlier hopefully, it will feel that hugely.”

NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte suggested that Brazil, China and India could be among the countries impacted if they continue to trade with Russia following Trump’s warning.

“My encouragement to these three countries, particularly is, if you live now in Beijing, or in Delhi, or you are the president of Brazil, you might want to take a look into this, because this might hit you very hard,” Rutte said.

“So please make the phone call to Vladimir Putin and tell him that he has to get serious about peace talks, because otherwise this will slam back on Brazil, on India and on China in a massive way,” he said.

Europeans promise to support weapons shipments

Several European countries pledged to support Trump’s proposal to send more weapons to Ukraine.

Denmark’s Foreign Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen said Copenhagen would “do its part” to finance Patriot systems for Ukraine, though he gave no specifics. “It seems the US is finally on the right side,” Rasmussen told reporters in Brussels.

The Netherlands and Sweden also said they were exploring ways to support the initiative. Sweden’s Defence Minister Pal Jonson welcomed Trump’s pressure on Russia and confirmed Stockholm would contribute to the delivery of weapons, though details remained unclear.

Lithuania’s Foreign Minister Kestutis Budrys said the announcements showed that “leadership is once again coming from the US.”

EU sanctions package stalls

But in a sign that European unity regarding Russia’s war on Ukraine remains fragile, the European Union’s planned 18th sanctions package stalled on Tuesday after Slovakia requested a delay in the vote. Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico, who visited the Kremlin last year, said the move reflected domestic political concerns over gas supplies amid a looming ban on Russian imports from 2028.

EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas voiced frustration at the setback. “I’m really sad the sanctions didn’t get approved,” she said. “But I hope they will be passed tomorrow.”

Kallas added that the EU welcomes Trump’s commitment to defending Ukraine but said Washington must also “share the burden”.

In a separate move, the European Council imposed asset freezes on five Russian judicial officials accused of persecuting opposition figure Alexei Gorinov, citing human rights violations.

BRITAIN faces war with Russia within the next five years, the previous head of the British Army has warned.

Former Chief of the General Staff General Sir Patrick Sanders, 59, said the UK must accept that armed conflict with Vladimir Putin by 2030 is a “realistic possibility”.

2

Gen Sir Patrick, who retired from the military last year, cautioned that the Army is currently too small to survive more than the first few months of such a war.

And he added that he did not know how many more “signals” ministers needed to realise it must strengthen the nation’s defences.

He said: “If Russia stops fighting in Ukraine, you get to a position where within a matter of months they will have the capability to conduct a limited attack on a Nato member that we will be responsible for supporting, and that happens by 2030.

“I don’t know what more signals we need for us to realise that if we don’t act now and we don’t act in the next five years to increase our resilience … I don’t know what more is needed.”

The former rifleman fell out of favour with the Government while leading the Army for being seen as too outspoken against troop cuts.

It was announced under the previous government that the Army would be reduced from just over 80,000 personnel as of October 2020 to 72,500 by 2025.

Gen Sir Patrick said: “At the moment, the British Army is too small to survive more than the first few months of an intensive engagement, and we’re going to need more.

“Now the first place you go to are the reserves, but the reserves are also too small.

“Thirty thousand reserves still only takes you to an army of 100,000.

“You know, I joined an Army in the Cold War that was about 140,000 regulars, and on top of that, a much larger reserve.”

Gen Sir Patrick said he was disappointed the Strategic Defence Review published last month “didn’t touch on this at all”.

Chancellor of the Exchequer Rachel Reeves last month committed to the defence budget rising to 2.6 per cent of the UK’s GDP by April 2027.

And PM Sir Keir Starmer pledged the UK would spend 5 per cent of GDP on national security within 10 years, with 3.5 per cent of that amount going to core defence matters.

But Sir Gen Patrick said that during his time at the head of the Army there had been unsuccessful “conversations” with the government about building bomb shelters for civilians and underground command centres for the military to prepare for an attack.

He said: “It always came down to a conversation of it being too costly and not a high enough priority and the threat didn’t feel sufficiently imminent or serious to make it worth it.

“Finland has bomb shelters for 4.5 million people. It can survive as a government and as a society under direct missile and air attacks from Russia. We don’t have that.”

Despite the biggest threat coming from Russia, Gen Sir Patrick also warned that Iran could act through proxies “to attack British interests in the UK”.

2

United States Secretary of State Marco Rubio met with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov for a second time in two days on Friday, with the war in Ukraine the focal point of their huddle. They had met for 50 minutes on the sidelines of the ASEAN summit in Malaysia on Thursday.

While campaigning for re-election, US President Donald Trump had promised to end the war in Ukraine within 24 hours of taking office.

But more than four months later, the prospects of a ceasefire appear as remote as ever, with Russia launching a fierce bombardment of Ukraine in recent days.

After the Thursday meeting, Rubio told reporters that Trump was  “disappointed and frustrated that there’s not been more flexibility on the Russian side” to bring an end to the war in Ukraine.

So has Trump’s view of the war changed – and what are his next options?

Has Trump’s position on Russia shifted?

Rubio’s comments come at a time when Trump has increasingly been publicly critical of Putin, after previously accusing Ukraine of not wanting peace.

“We get a lot of b******t thrown at us by Putin. He’s very nice all the time, but it turns out to be meaningless,” Trump said on Tuesday.

Since February, the US has held separate talks with Russia and Ukraine, and brokered direct talks between them in May in Istanbul for the first time since the early months of Russia’s full-fledged invasion in 2022.

But while Putin has offered brief pauses in fighting, he has not accepted the US proposal for an unconditional 30-day ceasefire. Ukraine has accepted that proposal. Russia argues that Ukraine could use the truce to remobilise troops and rearm itself.

When asked by reporters this week whether he would act on his frustration with Putin, Trump responded: “I wouldn’t be telling you. Don’t we want to have a little surprise?”

However, experts caution against concluding that Trump was ready to act tough against Russia.

“Western media is full of commentary on what it calls Trump‘s ‘changing stance’ on Putin. But as yet, there is no reason to think that anything has changed at all,” Keir Giles, a senior consulting fellow at the London-based Chatham House think tank, told Al Jazeera.

“There is a wave of optimism across the world that this might finally lead to a change in US policy. But, on every previous occasion, this has not happened.”

Indeed, after the Thursday meeting between Rubio and Lavrov, both sides suggested that they were willing to continue to engage diplomatically.

Arming Ukraine to fight off Russia

In early July, the Trump administration announced a decision to “pause” arms supply to Kyiv. A week later, he reversed this decision.

“We’re going to send some more weapons. We have to. They have to be able to defend themselves. They are getting hit very hard now,” said Trump on July 8.

On Thursday, Trump told NBC that these weapons would be sold to NATO, which will pay fully for them. NATO will then pass them on to Ukraine.

“We’re sending weapons to NATO, and NATO is paying for those weapons, a hundred percent,” Trump told NBC, adding that the US will be sending Patriot missiles to the alliance.

Trump said this deal was agreed on during the NATO summit in The Hague in June.

Trump had also frozen aid to Ukraine in February, after a falling out with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy following a rancorous meeting in the White House. Trump accused Zelenskyy of talking the US into “spending $350 Billion Dollars, to go into a War that couldn’t be won”.

Trump resumed the supplies weeks later. Between January 2022 and April 2025, the US has provided Ukraine with about $134bn in aid, according to the Kiel Institute for the World Economy.

Trump’s MAGA [Make America Great Again] base has been critical of the funding that the US provides Ukraine.

Following Trump’s announcement that the US will resume sending weapons to Ukraine, several conservative Americans have responded with disappointment.

“I did not vote for this,” wrote Derrick Evans on X on July 8. Evans was one of Trump’s supporters who stormed the US Capitol on January 6, 2021 and was arrested, to be pardoned by Trump in January this year.

Conservative social media duo Keith and Kevin Hodge wrote on X on July 8: “Who in the hell is telling Trump that we need to send more weapons to Ukraine?”

Sanctioning Russia

When asked on July 8 about his interest in a Congress bill proposing additional sanctions on Russia, Trump responded, “I’m looking at it very strongly.”

Since the war in Ukraine started in 2022, the US and its allies have imposed at least 21,692 sanctions on Russian individuals, media organisations, and institutions across sectors such as the military, energy, aviation, shipbuilding and telecommunications.

However, while these sanctions have hit Russia’s economy, it has not collapsed the way some experts had predicted it would in the early months of the war.

In recent months, Zelenskyy has repeatedly requested his allies in the West to tighten sanctions on Russia, to put pressure on Putin to end the war.

Most recently, Zelenskyy posted on X on Friday following a Russian drone attack in Kharkiv: “Sanctions must be strengthened. We are expecting the adoption of a new sanctions package. Everything that will put pressure on Russia and stop it must be implemented as quickly as possible.”

A bipartisan Senate bill sponsored by Republican Senator Lindsey Graham aims to levy tariffs on countries that import oil, gas and uranium from Russia.

In 2023, crude petroleum, petroleum gas and refined petroleum constituted nearly 54 percent of total Russian exports, according to the Observatory of Economic Complexity (OEC).

According to the OEC, China and India buy a bulk of Russia’s oil and gas products.

In 2024, Russian oil accounted for 35 percent of India’s total crude imports and 19 percent of China’s oil imports. Turkiye also imports Russian oil, with as much as 58 percent of its refined petroleum imports sourced from Russia in 2023.

But the West has not weaned itself off Russia, either.

In 2024, European countries paid more than $700m to buy Russian uranium products, according to an analysis by Brussels-based think tank Bruegel, based on data from the European Union’s statistical office, Eurostat.

In late March this year, Trump expressed anger with Putin and threatened “secondary tariffs” on any country that buys Russian oil if a ceasefire deal is not reached, but these tariffs were not imposed.

“If a new sanctions bill does pass, and the United States does impose costs on Moscow for the first time during the current administration, this would be a radical departure from Trump’s consistent policy,” Giles said.

“It remains to be seen whether Trump will in fact allow this, or whether his deference to Putin will mean he continues to resist any possible countermeasures against Moscow.”

Walking away from the conflict

On April 18, US Secretary of State Rubio said his country might “move on” from the Russia-Ukraine war if a ceasefire deal is not brokered.

“We are now reaching a point where we need to decide whether this is even possible or not,” Rubio told reporters in Paris after talks between American, Ukrainian and European officials.

“Because if it’s not, then I think we’re just going to move on. It’s not our war. We have other priorities to focus on,” Rubio continued.

On the same day, Trump echoed Rubio’s statements to reporters. However, Trump did not say that he is ready to walk away from peace negotiations.

“Well, I don’t want to say that, but we want to see it end,” Trump said.

More diplomacy

The second day of talks between Rubio and Lavrov, however, suggests that the US has not given up on diplomacy yet.

Rubio told reporters on Thursday that the US and Russia have exchanged new ideas for peace in Ukraine. “I think it’s a new and a different approach,” Rubio said, without offering any details of what the “new approach” involved.

“I wouldn’t characterise it as something that guarantees a peace, but it’s a concept that, you know, that I’ll take back to the president,” Rubio added.

Following Rubio and Lavrov’s meeting on Thursday, the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a news release that the US and Russia had “a substantive and frank exchange of views on the settlement in Ukraine” and will continue constructive dialogue.

The statement added: “[Russia and the US] have reaffirmed mutual commitment to searching for peaceful solutions to conflict situations and resuming Russian-US economic and humanitarian cooperation.”

US president voices frustration over the continuing war in Ukraine, says Vladimir Putin is ‘killing a lot of people’.

United States President Donald Trump says he is not happy with his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, over the continuation of the war in Ukraine and suggests he is considering additional sanctions against Moscow.

“We get a lot of b******t thrown at us by Putin,” Trump said during a meeting with his cabinet at the White House on Tuesday. “He’s very nice all the time, but it turns out to be meaningless.”

Putin is “killing a lot of people” and a lot of them are his soldiers and Ukraine’s forces, Trump added.

When asked about his interest in a bill proposed by the Senate for further sanctions on Russia, Trump said: “I’m looking at it very strongly.”

But he refused to preview his plans further when asked whether he will act on his frustration with Putin.

“I wouldn’t be telling you. Don’t we want to have a little surprise?” Trump told reporters. He then pivoted to discussing the lengthy planning for last month’s US strikes against Iran’s nuclear facilities.

Trump made the comments as French President Emmanuel Macron said in an address to the British Parliament that Europe will “never abandon Ukraine”.

Macron stressed that the United Kingdom and France will work with a “coalition of the willing” to support Ukraine.

“We will fight till the very last minute in order to get the ceasefire, in order to start the negotiations to build this robust and sustainable peace, because this is our security and our principles together which are at stake in Ukraine,” Macron said.

Earlier on Tuesday, Trump said his administration will send more weapons to Ukraine, adding that the new shipments would be primarily comprised of “defensive weapons”.

According to US media reports, Washington had paused the transfer of certain missiles and munitions to Ukraine due to its dwindling weapons stockpiles. The Pentagon said it was conducting a “capability review” of US weapons.

As a candidate, Trump promised to swiftly end the war in Ukraine. But so far, his diplomatic efforts – including several phone calls with Putin – have failed to stem the violence.

Ukrainian and Russian officials met for direct talks in Turkiye in May and agreed to a prisoner swap, but the two sides have not been able to reach a temporary truce, let alone a lasting ceasefire.

On Tuesday, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Moscow is waiting for Ukraine to propose possible dates for further negotiations. “As soon as dates are agreed – and we hope that it will be done – we will make an announcement,” he said.

Russia has been stepping up its long-range attacks on Ukrainian cities in recent weeks and has been slowly grinding its way forward along several parts of the Ukrainian front line in recent months.

On Monday, it announced that it had captured the Ukrainian village of Dachne in the Dnipropetrovsk region.

US President Donald Trump said he is tired of the meaningless “b*******” from his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin during negotiations over the war on Ukraine. He added that extra sanctions could be on the table.

Roman Starovoit was found dead near his car in the Moscow region hours after President Vladimir Putin dismissed him.

Russia’s top criminal investigation agency is probing the death of Roman Starovoit, a former transport minister whose body was found with a gunshot wound near his car, hours after President Vladimir Putin dismissed him from his post.

Authorities on Monday said the 53-year-old politician’s body was discovered near a Tesla vehicle abandoned near a park in the Moscow region, with a pistol, registered in Starovoit’s name, located nearby.

The Investigative Committee has opened a case to determine the full circumstances of his death, suggesting it could be suicide. Russian media, citing law enforcement sources, said the gunshot appeared to be self-inflicted.

However, the timing of the death has prompted speculation.

Putin issued a decree earlier on Monday, removing Starovoit as transport minister, a role he had held for just more than a year. No explanation was provided.

Political commentators quickly linked the decision to a long-running corruption investigation in the Kursk region, where Starovoit previously served as governor.

The probe centres on whether 19.4 billion roubles ($246m) allocated in 2022 to bolster border defences in Kursk were embezzled.

The funds were meant to reinforce Russia’s frontier with Ukraine, but Ukrainian forces launched a cross-border assault into the region three months into Starovoit’s ministerial term – the largest such incursion since World War II.

In April, his successor and former deputy in Kursk, Alexei Smirnov, was charged with embezzling defence funds. Several Russian outlets reported on Monday that Smirnov, who denies wrongdoing, had told investigators Starovoit was also involved in the alleged fraud.

The incident casts a shadow over Russia’s transport sector, already grappling with wartime pressures.

Western sanctions have left the aviation industry struggling for spare parts, while soaring interest rates have pushed Russian Railways – the country’s largest employer – into financial strain.

Meanwhile, Ukraine’s drone attacks continue to disrupt domestic air traffic, forcing temporary airport closures and leading to logistical uncertainty.

Following Starovoit’s dismissal, the Kremlin announced that Andrei Nikitin, former governor of the Novgorod region, had been appointed as acting transport minister. Photographs released by state media showed him shaking hands with Putin.

Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said Putin believed Nikitin had the necessary experience to steer the ministry through current challenges. At his meeting with the president, Nikitin pledged to modernise the sector by boosting digital infrastructure to improve cargo flows and cross-border trade.

Here are the key events on day 1,230 of Russia’s war on Ukraine.

Here is how things stand on Tuesday, July 8:

Fighting

• In Kharkiv, at least one person died and 71 others were wounded following a barrage of Russian drones. Local officials said residential buildings, a kindergarten, and the regional enlistment office sustained damage in two waves of attacks.
• Russia has stepped up its drone campaign across Ukraine, striking two military enlistment centres on Monday in Kharkiv and Zaporizhia, according to Ukraine’s armed forces. Kyiv says the latest attacks aim to disrupt mobilisation efforts.
• A separate drone strike hit a draft office in Kremenchuk on Sunday, signalling what Ukrainian officials describe as a targeted wave of assaults on recruitment infrastructure.
• Kharkiv Mayor Ihor Terekhov said six Shahed drones struck within a 10-minute window, describing the strikes as targeting “residential streets, cars, and people”.
• Another death was reported in Odesa following a drone attack. Meanwhile, an assault on Zaporizhia on Monday left at least 20 people injured, regional authorities said.

Politics and diplomacy

• Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy renewed calls for international assistance, stressing the growing urgency in countering Russia’s aerial offensive.
• Amid the escalating violence, United States President Donald Trump pledged on Monday to provide Ukraine with additional military aid, focusing on defensive weaponry. His statement came days after the US paused shipments of key arms, drawing sharp warnings from Kyiv.
• The United Kingdom announced new sanctions targeting Russia’s chemical weapons programme. London imposed asset freezes and travel bans on two senior military figures – Aleksey Viktorovich Rtishchev and Andrei Marchenko – as well as one Russian entity, for their alleged involvement in chemical weapon transfers and use in Ukraine.
• Former Russian Transport Minister Roman Starovoit was found dead from a gunshot wound in his car outside Moscow just hours after President Vladimir Putin dismissed him. Investigators suspect suicide. His removal has raised speculation of a link to a corruption inquiry over missing border defence funds in the Kursk region.
• Zelenskyy reportedly told Trump he plans to replace Ukraine’s ambassador to Washington as part of a major cabinet reshuffle expected next week. Ambassador Oksana Markarova has faced criticism from Trump’s allies in Congress, who say she is too aligned with the Democrats.
• At a White House dinner with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Trump aired his frustration with Putin, saying: “I’m not happy with President Putin at all.” His administration continues to face pressure over its lack of progress in ending the war.

The 17th BRICS summit is being held in Brazil, again aiming to balance Western economic power and political dominance.

But as the meetings take place, eyes are on the US and President Donald Trump’s trade tariffs, perhaps showing America still holds the cards.

While the host nation Brazil condemns Israel’s aggression and NATO’s increased defence spending, other countries are not so outspoken.

And two important faces are not attending – Chinese President Xi Jinping and Russian leader Vladimir Putin.

So does BRICS still have a cohesive purpose?

Has the grouping made tangible achievements over the years since it launched in 2009?

And what can it realistically hope to do, in today’s world?

Presenter:

James Bays

Guests:

Gustavo Ribeiro – Founder and editor-in-chief of The Brazilian Report

Sergey Markov –  Director at the Institute of Political Studies in Moscow and former public spokesman for Russian President Vladimir Putin

Jayant Menon – Former lead economist at Asian Development Bank and visiting senior fellow at ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute in Singapore

Here are the key events on day 1,229 of Russia’s war on Ukraine.

Here is how things stand on Monday, July 7:

Fighting

• Russian forces launched missile and drone attacks on the eastern Ukrainian province of Donetsk, killing four people in the town of Kostiantynivka and another in nearby Druzhkivka, according to officials.
• Donetsk Governor Vadim Filashkin urged residents of the front-line towns to evacuate, saying: “It is dangerous to stay here! Evacuate to safer regions of Ukraine!”
• Elsewhere in Ukraine, large-scale Russian drone attacks wounded three civilians in Kyiv, two in Kharkiv, and damaged port infrastructure in the central region of Mykolaiv, according to the governor.
• A woman who was wounded in a Russian attack on the city of Poltava in central Ukraine on July 3 died in hospital, taking the death toll from that attack to three, local officials said.
• Russia’s Ministry of Defence said that Russian forces seized the village of Piddubne in the Donetsk region and the village of Sobolivka, near the town of Kupiansk, in the Kharkiv region.
• Ukraine, too, launched drone attacks on Russia, injuring two civilians in Belgorod near the border and disrupting flights at airports in the capital, Moscow.
• Russia’s aviation agency, Rosaviatsia, said that the Ukrainian attacks forced at least three airports in Moscow, St Petersburg and Nizhny Novgorod to ground some 287 flights on Sunday.
• Russia’s Defence Ministry said its air defences shot down 120 Ukrainian drones during nighttime attacks, and 39 more before 2pm Moscow time (11:00 GMT) on Sunday.
• Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin later said that Russian air defence units downed six Ukrainian drones headed for Moscow.

Sanctions

• Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy signed a new sanctions package, “targeting numerous Russian financial schemes, particularly cryptocurrency-related ones”.

Politics and diplomacy

• Russian President Vladimir Putin is not attending the BRICS summit in Brazil this week, since he is wanted by the International Criminal Court (ICC) for his role in the 2022 full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Brazil is a signatory to the Rome Statute, and would be required to enforce the arrest warrant.
• Putin, speaking via a videolink, told the BRICS leaders that the era of liberal globalisation is obsolete and that the future belongs to swiftly growing emerging markets, which should enhance the use of their national currencies for trade.

Leaders expected to decry US President Donald Trump’s trade tariffs while presenting the bloc as a defender of multilateralism.

Leaders of the growing BRICS group are gathering in Brazil for a summit overshadowed by United States President Donald Trump’s new tariff policies while presenting the bloc as a defender of multilateralism.

The leaders, mainly from the developing world, will be discussing ways to increase cooperation amid what they say are serious concerns over Western dominance at their two-day summit that begins in Rio de Janeiro on Sunday.

The BRICS acronym is derived from the initial letters of the founding member countries: Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa. The bloc, which held its first summit in 2009, later added Egypt, Ethiopia, Indonesia, Iran, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates as full members. It also has 10 strategic partner countries, a category created last year, that includes Belarus, Cuba and Vietnam.

But for the first time since taking power in 2012, Chinese President Xi Jinping will not be attending in person, instead sending Prime Minister Li Qiang.

Russian President Vladimir Putin will also miss in-person attendance as he is wanted by the International Criminal Court (ICC) for his role in the 2022 invasion of Ukraine. Brazil, as a signatory to the Rome Statute, would be required to enforce the arrest warrant.

The notable absences are raising questions over the group’s cohesion and global clout.

Now chaired by Brazil, leaders at the BRICS summit are expected to decry the Trump administration’s “indiscriminate” trade tariffs, saying they are illegal and risk hurting the global economy. Global health policies, artificial intelligence and climate change will also be on the agenda.

The BRICS countries say they represent almost half of the world’s population, 36 percent of global land area, and a quarter of the global economic output. The bloc sees itself as a forum for cooperation between countries of the Global South and a counterweight to the Group of Seven (G7), comprised of leading Western economic powers.

However, behind the scenes, divisions are evident. According to a source quoted by The Associated Press news agency, some member states are calling for a firmer stance on Israel’s war in Gaza and its recent strikes on Iran. The source requested anonymity due to the sensitivity of the discussions. Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian and Egypt’s Abdel Fattah el-Sisi will be attending the Rio summit.

But Al Jazeera’s Lucia Newman, reporting from Rio, said the group’s aim remains clear.

“The BRICS goal is to exert pressure for a multipolar world with inclusive global governance to give a meaningful voice to the Global South, especially in the trading system,” she said.

“It’s not super organised, nor does it have a radical global impact,” Newman added. “The real question is, can an expanded BRICS whose members have very different political systems and priorities form a sufficiently unified bloc to have any significant impact?”

Russian president says future talks need to be between Kyiv and Moscow amid signs latter does not want US involvement.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has told his United States counterpart, Donald Trump, that Moscow will not give up on its goal of eliminating the “root causes” of the war in Ukraine.

“Russia will not back down,” Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov told reporters although he added that Putin had also expressed a “readiness” to “seek a political and negotiated solution to the conflict” during his one-hour phone conversation with Trump on Thursday.

The phrase “root causes” is shorthand for the Kremlin’s argument that it was compelled to launch a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022 to prevent the country from joining NATO and being used by the Western alliance as a launchpad to attack Russia – arguments rejected by Kyiv and its allies but supported in part by Trump.

Trump said after the call that he had made “no progress” with Putin on moving towards a ceasefire, adding that he was “not happy” about the war in Ukraine.

The phone call, their sixth since Trump started his second term in January, came the day after the Pentagon confirmed it was halting some weapons deliveries to Kyiv, including air defence missiles and precision-guided artillery. They were promised under President Joe Biden’s administration. The announcement was made as Russia has intensified its attacks on Ukraine

Trump and Putin did not broach the subject of the paused weapons deliveries, according to the Kremlin aide, who said the US president had raised the issue of bringing about a swift end to the war.

While the prospect of a face-to-face meeting was not discussed, the two leaders agreed to keep talking.

Although Trump has tried to mediate in the Ukraine war, he has little progress to show for it. Putin has thus far rejected Washington’s proposal for an unconditional ceasefire, and there was nothing in the Kremlin readout to suggest any shift in his position. Ukraine supported the proposal.

Ushakov said that while Russia was open to continuing to speak with the US, any peace negotiations needed to occur between Moscow and Kyiv.

He made the comment amid some indications that Moscow is trying to avoid a trilateral format for any peace negotiations. Ukrainian officials have said Russian negotiators asked US diplomats to leave the room during a meeting in Istanbul in early June.

Putin and Trump last talked in mid-June when Putin offered to mediate in the recent 12-day Iran-Israel war. Trump responded to Putin’s offer by switching the focus back to Ukraine, saying: “No, I don’t need help with Iran. I need help with you.”

Ushakov said that during Thursday’s call, Putin emphasised the need to resolve all “disputes, disagreements and conflict situations” regarding Iran through diplomatic means.

The US waded into the Israel-Iran conflict last month, bombing three of Iran’s nuclear sites, a move condemned by Moscow as unprovoked and illegal.

Earlier on Thursday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy met European Union leaders in Denmark, saying doubts over US military aid to Ukraine reinforced the need to “strengthen our cooperation and coordination through the EU, NATO and also in our direct relations”.

Trump has in effect nixed Ukraine’s attempts to join the NATO military alliance.

Zelenskyy told reporters he hopes to speak to Trump as soon as Friday about the pause in weapons shipments.

Supreme Court lifted group’s ‘terrorist’ designation in April, as Moscow seeks normalisation in bid for regional clout.

Russia has accepted the credentials of a new ambassador of Afghanistan as part of an ongoing drive to build friendly relations with the country’s Taliban authorities, which seized power as United States troops withdrew from the country four years ago.

“We believe that the act of official recognition of the government of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan will give impetus to the development of productive bilateral cooperation between our countries in various fields,” said the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs in a statement on Thursday.

The move makes Russia the first country in the world to recognise the country’s Taliban government.

“This brave decision will be an example for others,” Afghan Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi said in a video of a meeting on Thursday with Dmitry Zhirnov, the Russian ambassador to Kabul, posted on X.

“Now that the process of recognition has started, Russia was ahead of everyone.”

The move is likely to be closely watched by Washington, which has frozen billions in Afghanistan’s central bank assets and enforced sanctions on some senior leaders in the Taliban, which has contributed to Afghanistan’s banking sector being largely cut off from the international financial system.

The group seized power in Afghanistan in August 2021, when US forces supporting the country’s internationally recognised government pulled out.

Moscow, which called the US withdrawal a “failure”, has taken steps to normalise relations with the Taliban authorities since then, seeing them as a potential economic partner and ally in fighting terrorism.

A Taliban delegation attended Russia’s flagship economic forum in Saint Petersburg in 2022 and 2024, and the group’s top diplomat met Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov in Moscow last October.

In July 2024, Russian President Vladimir Putin called the Taliban “allies in the fight against terrorism” – notably against Islamic State Khorasan Province, ISKP (ISIS-K), a group responsible for deadly attacks in both Afghanistan and Russia.

In April, Russia’s Supreme Court lifted the “terrorist” designation for the group.

Lavrov said that month that “the new authorities in Kabul are a reality”, urging Moscow to adopt a “pragmatic, not ideologised policy” towards the Taliban.

Competing for influence

Moscow’s attitude towards the Taliban has shifted drastically over the last two decades.

The group was formed in 1994 during the Afghan Civil War, largely by former US-supported Mujahideen fighters who battled the Soviet Union during the 1980s.

The Soviet-Afghan war resulted in a stinging defeat for Moscow that may have hastened the demise of the USSR.

Russia put the Taliban on its “terrorist” blacklist in 2003 over its support for separatists in the North Caucasus.

But the Taliban’s return to power in 2021 has forced Russia and other countries in the region to change tack as they compete for influence.

Russia was the first country to open a business representative office in Kabul after the Taliban takeover, and has announced plans to use Afghanistan as a transit hub for gas heading to Southeast Asia.

The Afghan government is not officially recognised by any world body, and the United Nations refers to the administration as the “Taliban de facto authorities”.

Maksym Ustimenko’s aircraft shot down seven air targets before losing altitude and crashing, the air force says.

Ukraine has lost an F-16 aircraft and its pilot while repelling a Russian missile and drone strike, according to the war-torn country’s air force.

After shooting down seven air targets, the plane was damaged and lost altitude overnight, the Ukrainian military said in a statement published on Telegram on Sunday.

“This night, while repelling a massive enemy air attack, a pilot of the 1st class, Lieutenant Colonel Maksym Ustimenko, born in 1993, died on an F-16 aircraft,” it said.

In a separate statement, the air force said Russia launched 537 projectiles against Ukraine, including Shahed drones, cruise and ballistic missiles. Ukraine claimed to have intercepted 475 of them.

According to the Kyiv Independent newspaper, the sound of explosions and strikes was reported in multiple areas across the country, including in southern Mykolaiv, southeastern Zaporizhia and western Lviv.

Ihor Taburets, the governor of central Ukraine’s Cherkasy region, said at least six people were injured and civilian infrastructure was damaged in attacks. Three multistorey buildings and a college were damaged in the attack, he said.

Industrial facilities were hit in the southern Ukrainian region of Mykolaiv and the central Dnipropetrovsk region, officials say. Local authorities published photos of high-rise residential buildings with charred walls and broken windows, and rescuers evacuating people.

In Russia, the Ministry of Defence said its forces destroyed three Ukrainian drones in the border regions of Kursk and Rostov, and in Ukraine’s annexed Crimean Peninsula.

The latest wave of violence comes after Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Friday he intended to scale back military expenditure and also indicated he was ready for a new round of peace negotiations with Ukraine.

In the past months, Moscow and Kyiv have sent delegations twice to the Turkish city of Istanbul for peace talks, but have made no progress towards ending the conflict, which started after Russia invaded its neighbour more than three years ago.

However, both sides agreed upon and showed cooperation on prisoners’ swap.

Here are the key events on day 1,220 of Russia’s war on Ukraine.

Here is how things stand on Saturday, June 28:

Fighting

• Ukraine’s military has said it struck four Russian Su-34 warplanes at the Marinovka base outside Russia’s city of Volgograd, some 900km (550 miles) from the Ukrainian border.
• A Russian missile attack has killed at least five people and wounded more than 20 in Samar in Ukraine’s southeast, in the second strike on the industrial city in three days.
• Russian troops have captured the village of Nova Kruhlyakivka in Ukraine’s eastern Kharkiv region, Russia’s state news agency TASS reported.
• A Russian attack has damaged an “important power facility” in Ukraine’s southern Kherson region, causing power cuts in some settlements in the region, regional governor Oleksandr Prokudin said.
• A Ukrainian drone attack on Russia’s Kursk region injured a war correspondent from Chinese news outlet Phoenix TV, Russian authorities said, as they urged the United Nations to respond to the incident.
• Ukraine’s air force said it downed 359 out of 363 drones and six of eight missiles launched by Russia in an overnight attack.
• Russia’s drone production jumped by 16.9 percent in May compared with the previous month, data from a think tank close to the government showed, after President Vladimir Putin called for output to be stepped up.

Ceasefire deal

• United States President Donald Trump said he thinks something will happen in Russia’s war in Ukraine that would get it “settled”, citing his recent call with Putin but offering no other details.
• Putin said relations between Russia and the US were beginning to stabilise, attributing the improvement to efforts by President Trump. Putin reiterated that he had “great respect” for the US leader and was willing to meet him.
• Putin also said Moscow was ready to hold a new round of peace negotiations with Ukraine, potentially in Istanbul, although the time and venue have yet to be agreed.

NATO

• Lithuania has notified the UN that it is leaving the treaty banning antipersonnel landmines. It joins Latvia, Estonia, Finland and Poland – all NATO and European Union members bordering Russia – in withdrawing from the treaty, citing the increased military danger from their Russian neighbour.
• The Kremlin said Estonia’s stated readiness to host NATO allies’ US-made F-35A stealth jets, capable of carrying nuclear weapons, posed a direct threat to Moscow.
• Putin said Russia was looking to cut its military expenditure from next year, contrasting that with NATO’s plan to raise its collective spending goal to 5 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) in the next 10 years.

Sanctions

• Senator Ron Wyden, the top Senate Finance Committee Democrat, pressed US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent to commit to enforcing Ukraine-related sanctions against Russia and to clarify comments about Russia rejoining an international bank payments network.
• Wyden also sought answers on how the US-Ukraine critical minerals deal and investment agreement would help improve Ukraine’s post-war security and not benefit any entity or country that aided Russia’s war effort.
• Ukraine plans to ask the EU to sanction Bangladeshi entities it says are importing wheat taken from Ukrainian territories occupied by Russia, after its warnings to Dhaka failed to stop the trade, a top Ukrainian diplomat in South Asia said.

Russian leader indicates longterm plan to cut military spending, as his forces vie for foothold in Ukraine’s Dnipropetrovsk.

Russian forces have continued to hammer Ukraine’s Dnipropetrovsk region, launching a deadly attack on the industrial city of Samar for the second time in three days.

Friday’s missile attack killed five people and injured 23 others in southeastern Samar – located outside the region’s main city, Dnipro – said regional governor Sergiy Lysak in a post on Telegram.

At least four of the wounded were in severe condition and were taken to hospital, he added.

The attack followed missile strikes earlier this week on both Dnipro and Samar, which killed at least 23, as Russian forces attempted to gain a foothold in Dnipropetrovsk for the first time in over three years of war.

Officials gave no immediate details about the damage inflicted on Samar, where an attack on an unidentified infrastructure facility on Tuesday killed two people.

Moscow earlier this week claimed to have captured two more villages near the border of the Dnipropetrovsk region.

Separately, authorities in Ukraine’s northern region of Kharkiv said Russian attacks killed one person and wounded three others.

Hundreds of kilometres to the south, in the Kherson region, authorities urged residents on Friday to prepare for extended periods without power after a Russian attack hit a key energy facility.

Governor Oleksandr Prokudin said on Telegram that “Russians decided to plunge the region into darkness”.

The Ukrainian air force said Russia had launched 363 long-range drones and eight missiles overnight into Friday, claiming that air defences stopped all but four of the drones and downed six cruise missiles.

Russia’s Defence Ministry, meanwhile, said 39 Ukrainian drones were downed in several regions overnight, including 19 over the Rostov region and 13 over the Volgograd region.

‘Find a path’ in peace talks

The continued attacks on Dnipropetrovsk came as President Vladimir Putin said that he intended to scale back military expenditure and also indicated he was ready for a new round of peace negotiations with Ukraine.

The Russian president said his country was ready to reduce the military budget in the long term, owing to budgetary pressures and the increased defence spending having fuelled inflation.

Speaking to reporters in Minsk, Belarus, on Friday, he alluded to a new round of peace negotiations with Ukraine, potentially in Istanbul, although the time and venue had yet to be agreed.

He acknowledged that the peace proposals from Russia and Ukraine “are two absolutely contradictory memorandums”, but added, “That’s why negotiations are being organised and conducted, in order to find a path to bringing them closer together.”

Putin added that the two sides’ negotiators were in constant contact and that Russia was ready to return the bodies of 3,000 more Ukrainian soldiers.

He also said relations between Russia and the United States were beginning to stabilise, attributing the improvement to efforts by US President Donald Trump.

“In general, thanks to President Trump, relations between Russia and the United States are beginning to level out in some ways,” said Putin.

Trump on Friday suggested progress may be on the horizon regarding Russia’s war in Ukraine.

“We’re working on that one,” Trump told reporters at the White House. “President Putin called up and he said, I’d love to help you with Iran. I said, do me a favour: I’ll handle Iran. Help me with Russia. We got to get that one settled. And I think something’s going to happen there.”

Ukrainian leader signs an accord with the Council of Europe to set up a special tribunal to one day put top Russian officials on trial.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has called for the prosecution of Russian President Vladimir Putin, whom he accused of being a “war criminal” for launching Russia’s attack on Ukraine.

Zelenskyy issued the call late on Wednesday after he signed an accord with the Council of Europe to set up a special tribunal to prosecute Russian officials, including Putin, for the invasion of Ukraine.

“We need to show clearly, aggression leads to punishment, and we must make it happen together, all of Europe,” said Zelenskyy after signing the accord with Council of Europe Secretary-General Alain Berset.

“It will take strong political and legal courage to make sure every Russian war criminal faces justice, including Putin,” Zelenskyy said.

Putin is already facing an arrest warrant issued by the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague for the alleged war crime of illegally transporting children out of Ukraine.

The ICC has the jurisdiction to investigate war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide, but it does not have the jurisdiction to investigate “crimes of aggression” or the use of armed force against another state.

The special tribunal is being established to one day prosecute Russia’s “crime of aggression” for the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. The tribunal could, in theory, put on trial senior Russian figures, including Putin.

It has not yet been decided where the tribunal would be based, but Zelenskyy said The Hague, the home of the ICC, would be “perfect”.

This is the first time such a tribunal has been set up under the aegis of the Council of Europe, the continent’s top rights body.

Ursula von der Leyen, President of the European Commission, previously said the special tribunal would “give Ukraine a path to justice for the top-level decision to invade its territory – a wrong that no other international court or tribunal can currently address”.

The European Council said the proposed tribunal could potentially be used to prosecute North Korean and Belarusian individuals who assisted Russia in the invasion.

The 46-member Council of Europe is not part of the European Union and members include key non-EU European states such as Turkiye, the United Kingdom and Ukraine. Russia was expelled from the body in the wake of its invasion of Ukraine.

Alongside its arrest warrant for Putin, the ICC is also seeking to arrest four of Russia’s top commanders for targeting civilians.

A Russian missile attack on Ukraine’s Dnipro region killed at least 17 people and wounded more than 200 others, including 18 children, Ukrainian officials said. As rescue crews combed through rubble, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy urged NATO allies in the Netherlands to invest in Ukraine’s defence.