“Suddenly, say those who live there, the mood in Moscow feels very different,” said Adrian Blomfield in The Telegraph. Ever since Ukraine’s counteroffensive stalled in 2023, Russia’s capital had “exuded confidence. Its residents could either bathe in the patriotic glory of war or ignore it altogether”. But lately, “bombast” has given way to fear, and to a longing for the conflict to end; and this feeling became more acute this month, when Moscow and its wider region came under fire from a barrage of Ukrainian drones.

It was “one of the most sustained aerial attacks of the conflict” so far. Three people were killed; all four of Moscow’s airports had to close; an oil refinery and residential buildings were hit. “Muscovites listening to drones buzz overhead and air defences firing into the night” were given a “glimpse of life in Kyiv – and they did not like it”.

‘Completely unravelling’

Events have not been in the Kremlin’s favour lately, said the Financial Times. Ukraine has upped its use of long-range drones to target energy and military facilities deep in Russia. On the front line, Russia is “scratching out meagre territorial gains at a devastating human cost”: US Secretary of State Marco Rubio recently asserted that it is “losing 15,000-20,000 soldiers a month. Not injured. Dead.”

The Russian economy, meanwhile, is ailing: some analysts reckon that inflation is running well above the official 5.6%; and interest rates are at a punishing 14.5%. Vladimir Putin has tried to bury bad news by tightening state control over the internet, said Phillips Payson O’Brien in The Atlantic. Even so, videos have increasingly been circulating in which Russians express “shock at their capital’s vulnerability”. His long-standing narrative, that the conflict in Ukraine is a “special military operation” that needn’t trouble Russia’s elites or middle classes, is “completely unravelling”.

‘Most challenging period’

Putin’s calculus on the war in Ukraine has not changed, said Pjotr Sauer and Shaun Walker in The Guardian. He remains determined to “press on” in the (surely misguided) belief that Moscow can capture the whole of Ukraine’s eastern Donbas region by the end of the year. Such “bravado”, however, is doing little to ease the disquiet inside Russia; and speculation is growing that Putin’s regime could be toppled from within.

There have been reports that Sergei Shoigu, the former defence minister, could emerge as a threat to his former boss’s grip on power. The likelihood of an imminent Kremlin coup may be remote; but there’s no doubt that, at 73, Putin is entering “the most challenging period of his long rule”.

The Russian drone that struck a Romanian apartment building, causing a fire and injuring two people, is not the first time a Nato member has been hit during the war with Ukraine but it comes at a perilous moment for the alliance.

General Secretary Mark Rutte condemned “Russia’s reckless behaviour” as “a danger to us all”. He said he had assured Romania’s President Nicușor Dan that Nato "stands ready to defend every inch of allied territory".

But the “growing fear in European capitals is that President Vladimir Putin will try next to reshuffle the cards by expanding the conflict” to other parts of the continent, said Yaroslav Trofimov in The Wall Street Journal.

What did the commentators say?

“There have been numerous incidents of drones crashing in countries across the region throughout the Russia-Ukraine war,” said Vitaly Shevchenko on BBC Monitoring. “Generally, these have been described as accidents, although it is difficult to verify the intention behind each of these events.”

In recent weeks, Russia “has made increasingly bellicose statements against the Baltic states”, said the WSJ. It has threatened to bomb “decision-making centres” in Latvia, after accusing the country of hosting Ukrainian drone operators, while air-raid alarms were sounded in Lithuania last week when suspected Russian drones approached its airspace from Belarus.

As Russia “fails to gain ground in Ukraine and suffers staggering troop casualties”, said Adam Goldman in The New York Times, Putin “appears to be pursuing a wider conflict in Europe, increasingly targeting critical infrastructure and supply chains”.

Moscow is “scaling up its daily hybrid activity against the UK and Europe”, said Anne Keast-Butler, director of GCHQ. The UK’s intelligence, security and cyber agency has been countering what Keast-Butler called the Kremlin’s “reckless sabotage and assassination attempts”.

“Russia can’t afford to continue the war on its current trajectory because it will face the trap of diminishing resources,” Oleksandr V. Danylyuk, chair of the Center for Defense Reforms think tank in Kyiv, told the WSJ. “This means that Putin will have to escalate.” It’s quite plausible that he does this “by expanding the geography of the conflict as he seeks to freeze the war on better terms”.

De-escalation on both sides seems quite a way off, said Yauheni Preiherman, founder and director of the Minsk Dialogue Council on International Relations think tank, on Al Jazeera.

“The rhetoric on both sides says it all.” Lithuanian foreign minister Kestutis Budrys replied to Moscow’s bomb threats by saying that, if necessary, Nato “has all the means to level the Russian air defence and missile bases”. But “simply doubling down” on the “political posturing” that has “essentially brought about the current situation will only continue making things worse for everyone”.

What next?

President Trump’s recent threats to withdraw from Nato, and his decision to reduce US forces deployed in Europe, have undermined the alliance’s deterrence. Senior European officials told the WSJ they fear Russia may see an opening in the next 12 months but it would be a risky endeavour.

“This would be such a huge and additional big risk for Putin to, after having been not sufficiently successful against Ukraine, to simply add another very strong adversary in a military conflict,” said Norbert Röttgen, a German politician. Putin, however, is known for taking big gambles, he added. “Despite my doubts, we also have to calculate that Putin behaves irrationally and in an escalatory way.”

The “vulnerability” of the civilian energy infrastructure was exposed this week when a drone strike on the United Arab Emirates cut off power to a nuclear reactor, said Bloomberg.

It’s the first time a fully operating nuclear power plant has had to rely on back-up generators because of a military attack, but reactors in Ukraine and Iran have also been threatened by recent conflicts.

Why would a nuclear site be targeted?

A country might target a nuclear power plant to cripple an enemy’s power grid, or to force a surrender through the psychological terror of threatening a radiological disaster. An attack on such facilities could also be used to delay a nation’s ability to enrich nuclear material.

Alternatively, armies may attack, or occupy, a nuclear plant to seize control of a strategic geographic corridor or to prevent defending forces from using the area.

What does international law say?

Under the Geneva Conventions, civilian structures, including nuclear power plants, “are protected against attack”, but the treaties also state that they can be hit “for such time as they are military objectives”. This is a “loophole” that “aggressor states” have “interpreted widely”, said Dan Sabbagh, The Guardian’s defence and security editor.

Attacking a nuclear power plant also breaks legal resolutions passed by the UN Security Council and the International Atomic Energy Agency’s board of governors.

What would happen if a site were hit?

An attack on a nuclear site would not necessarily lead to a mushroom cloud or an immediate release of radiation because modern plants are built with multiple safety systems that can shut down reactors and contain damage.

But the reactor’s core could continue to heat up after a strike. This could lead to a build up of hydrogen gas, which could cause further explosions and damage. If the reactor began to degrade, radioactive material could be released and that can remain in the environment for years or even decades. It could potentially spread across borders and enter water systems or settle into the soil.

There are other consequences. Attacks on nuclear installations “risk undermining the emerging nuclear renaissance” in Western economies as an alternative to fossil fuels, said Bloomberg. Politicians and the public are “highly sensitive to radiation emergencies”, so an incident in one country “tends to dampen enthusiasm” for nuclear power elsewhere.

An attack on a nuclear plant would also be a hugely symbolic moment. Although conventional power plants have been “repeatedly bombed” by Russia during the Ukraine war, said Sabbagh, Kyiv’s three functioning nuclear plants have “remained relatively unscathed” because Moscow regarded a direct attack on them to be “taboo”.

Russian forces last month lost more territory to Ukraine than they were able to capture. The first of such occurrences in nearly two years, this marks an ignominious milestone and potential turning point in Moscow’s years-long invasion effort. At the same time, Russia is losing soldiers faster than it can recruit and deploy them. While the Ukraine front remains an active war zone that has left deep scars on both nations, there is a growing sense among observers that momentum has shifted in Kyiv’s favor.

What did the commentators say?

Russia’s conspicuously “diminished” Victory Day parade this month “signaled its vulnerability,” said The Economist. That sentiment was an “accurate reflection of Russia’s battlefield setbacks,” as well as the country’s “fear of the growing effectiveness of Ukraine’s long-range strikes.”

Russia’s weakened position can be traced to a confluence of three factors, said The Economist, citing research from the Institute for the Study of War: Ukrainian “ground counter-attacks and mid-range strikes,” the end of Russia’s “illicit use of Starlink terminals in Ukraine” and the Kremlin’s “paranoid throttling of the Telegram messaging app at home.” At the same time, Russia’s “exaggerated territorial ambitions and aggressive territorial demands” have run “completely counter to battlefield reality,” said the Institute.

May marks the fifth consecutive month in which Russia has lost “more soldiers than it can replace,” said National Security Journal. Ahead of an expected fifth summer of violence, Russia’s invasion “continues to falter” as the “fortunes of the war” seem to be “trending less and less in Russia’s favor.” Ukraine’s military technological advances have “not been the only key element” in Kyiv’s “recent battlefield gains.” Rather, they come amid Russia’s “growing command-and-control problems within its own military.”

Communications failures “contributed significantly to Russia’s problems” on the battlefield, said the Atlantic Council. After SpaceX “cut the Russian army’s illicit access to the satellite-based Starlink system” this spring, some Russian commanders were “forced to rely on inaccurate maps” showing “exaggerated gains.” In other cases, clusters of Russian troops were deployed “without adequate communication tools or coordination,” leaving them “highly vulnerable to Ukrainian counterattacks.”

All this comes as the public mood within Russia is “souring,” said Alexander Baunov at the Carnegie Russia Eurasia Center. The Putin government has “unceremoniously violated” the terms of its social trade-off offered to the public — that “you can live outside of the war, but you cannot be against it” — and now “society is angry.” Russian authorities have also banned the use of “popular foreign messaging apps” because they are “nontransparent” and boosted the “homegrown” Max app as an alternative. But the “implication” of Max’s transparency “has not gone unnoticed, and people feel their privacy has been rudely invaded.”

Russians “increasingly chafe” at the “restrictions on their liberties” imposed “in pursuit of a battlefield victory that now appears to be unattainable,” said Noah Rothman at the National Review. Moscow lacks “freedom of action” in the theater of battle and has “lost the ability to dictate the tempo of events,” while its economy contracts “following several years of war-driven growth.”

What next?

The Russian military’s “recent communications problems” are “unlikely to persist in their current form indefinitely,” said the Atlantic Council. Moscow has already explored a “range of alternatives, including relay drones and satellite links.” But it will probably take a “number of years for the Russian military to replicate the same level of efficiency previously provided by Starlink.”

Russia’s flagging battlefield progress is a problem for Putin, who has “insisted that Russia’s victory in the war is inevitable,” said CNN. That promise has “always been flawed,” given how “slow and incredibly costly the Russian advances have been.” Still, the momentum shift of late “feels like an inflection point in the war,” said Sir Lawrence Freedman, an emeritus professor of war studies at King’s College London, to The Economist. “If the Russians have nothing to show for their efforts, I would not be surprised if in some places things start crumbling.”

Ukraine in recent months has slowed Russia’s invasion to a near-halt and forced Moscow to ramp up its own security measures. Kyiv’s homegrown drone technology and techniques are now in demand around the world. These accomplishments have come despite diminished U.S. support for Ukraine’s warfighting efforts.

What did the commentators say?

The fight against Russia is “going better than you think,” said Vox. Kyiv still relies on the “fickle U.S. government” for Patriot missiles and battlefield intelligence, but Ukrainian leaders have “more confidence” in their ability to withstand the invasion than they did a few months ago. The “Ukraine line is not really in danger of breaking” even though Russia has “sustained enormous casualties” in attempts to advance, military analyst Franz-Stefan Gady said to the outlet. Ukraine might not be winning the war at this point, said Vox, but it “doesn’t appear to be losing.” Its leaders now believe Ukraine “no longer needs the United States as much” as it did early in the war, said The New York Times.

Ukraine “has finally given up” on President Donald Trump, Phillips Payson O’Brien said at The Atlantic. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is “aggressively seeking new diplomatic and military partners” and has sent drones to strike Russian oil facilities despite U.S. warnings against doing so. American leaders have “reduced what little weaponry” they were sending to Ukraine and pressured Zelenskyy to cede territory in exchange for peace. But Ukraine’s ability to adapt with reduced American support “has been startling.”

It is “significant” that Ukraine is “reversing the trend” of Russia’s progress in the war, The Wall Street Journal said in an editorial. One sign: Russian leader Vladimir Putin scaled back his country’s usual Victory Day parade in early May out of apparent fears of a Ukrainian drone strike. It is clear the “tide may be turning against Russia” after four years of war. That is an opportunity for the U.S. to “increase support for Ukraine so it can keep the pressure on Russia” and bring the struggle to an end.

The war will not end unless Ukraine inflicts a “decisive defeat” on Russia that poses a “direct threat to Putin’s regime,” Andrew A. Michta said at 19FortyFive. Putin’s military is “well positioned to continue” thanks to the backing of China’s industrial might and money flowing in from oil sales. Trump’s pressure on Zelenskyy to negotiate is a “signal to Moscow that its strategy is working.”

What next?

The U.S. is now looking to Ukraine for help in the war against Iran. The two sides this month signed an agreement to potentially “export military technology to the U.S.” and manufacture Ukranian-designed drones in the United States, said CBS News. Kyiv has “sent drone interceptors and pilots to the Middle East” to defend Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates against Iranian attacks. Ukraine is a “hub for drone innovation,” said the Financial Times. That is expertise the U.S. now needs.

For nearly a quarter of a century, Vladimir Putin has led the Russian Federation as one of the most successful authoritarians on Earth. But more than four years after launching an all-out invasion of Ukraine, the Russian president synonymous with Moscow’s kleptocratic rule finds himself in unfamiliar territory. Russia is now roiled by rumors of organized unrest with months to go before parliamentary elections, while Putin himself faces allegations of extreme isolation and a weakening grip on power.

What did the commentators say?

There is a sense of “mounting unease within the Kremlin” as it grapples with domestic and economic problems plus “increasing signs of dissent and setbacks on the battlefield in Ukraine,” said CNN, citing a report from a European intelligence agency. The Kremlin has “dramatically increased” Putin’s security, even installing surveillance systems “in the homes of close staffers” in measures “prompted by a wave of assassinations of top Russian military figures and fears of a coup.” Putin is “increasingly concerned” about an alleged “plot by members of the Russian political elite to topple him, or even assassinate him with drones,” said The Times. The president and his family have “stopped visiting their luxury residences” and Putin is spending “weeks at a time in bunkers.”

The report focuses on “growing internal tensions” between Putin and former Defense Minister and current Security Council Secretary Sergei Shoigu, said the Kyiv Post. Considered a “potential coup risk” for his “continued influence within the military leadership,” Shoigu has not “personally” been linked with hard evidence to “any wrongdoing.” The arrest this past March of one of Shoigu’s deputies was “presented in the report” as a “sign of weakening informal protections among the elite” that has contributed to the tensions.

Putin’s slipping power is “not only about falling approval ratings,” said The Economist. Russia’s future is “no longer discussed” in terms of what Putin “will decide” but as “something that will unfold independently of him — and possibly already without him.” This waning authority comes from a “confluence” of factors, including rising wartime costs and a “growing demand for rules among elites who have been forced back into Russia, along with their capital.” Shifting geopolitical winds and the collapse of Russia’s previous “social contract,” in which the state “stayed out of people’s private lives while citizens stayed out of politics,” have created a “situation which in chess is known as a Zugzwang: when every move worsens the position.”

This isn’t to say that “revolution is imminent” or that the 73-year-old Putin “will be sidelined soon,” said The Wall Street Journal. Nevertheless, the “change in mood is remarkable” compared to “just last December,” when Russia was “buoyed by hopes” of a Moscow-friendly, Trump-negotiated ceasefire with Ukraine.

Changes in national mood notwithstanding, the “sudden spate” of coup-oriented reporting stemming from the “conveniently anonymous ‘European intelligence agency’” looks “suspiciously more like a psyop meant to generate paranoia in the Russian elite than a serious assessment,” said The Spectator. Europe has a “desperate appetite” for a “deus ex machina, for some miraculous end to the Ukraine war,” and a coup to oust Putin “certainly fits the bill.” Still, this would “hardly be the first time” intelligence services “succumbed to the temptation to provide their masters with what they want, not need, to hear.”

What next?

For the time being, Moscow “understands that there could be serious discontent ahead” and has accordingly “decided to allow low-level discontent to manifest itself,” said former Putin adviser Marat Gelman at the Journal. As things stand, Putin has “enough resources to crush any civil revolt.”

“In Russia, they say that things don’t happen fast, but when they happen, they happen fast,” former U.S. Ambassador to Russia John Sullivan said to the Journal. While he “wouldn’t have said it a year or two ago,” civic revolt is “possible now.”

What happened

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Saturday presided over the “most ‌scaled-back Victory Day parade in years,” Reuters said. Afterward, he told reporters he thought the Ukraine war was “coming to an end.” President Donald Trump last week said Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy had agreed to exchange 1,000 war prisoners and pause the fighting through Monday to mark the annual celebration of the Soviet victory over Nazi Germany.

Who said what

Russia’s “markedly pared down” Victory Day parade “went forward amid veiled threats from Ukraine,” Radio Free Europe said. Zelenskyy “issued a mocking statement” beforehand “saying he was authorizing the Kremlin parade to be held” free from attacks. If Putin’s parade was “subdued” because he “feared a long-range Ukrainian drone strike” in Red Square. This is “one more sign that the tide may be turning against Russia after four long years of death,” The Wall Street Journal said in an editorial.

What next?

Russia’s Ukraine offensive “has slowed to a crawl” and its “challenges on the battlefield complicate the narrative of imminent victory” Putin is “selling” Trump to convince him Kyiv needs to cede land in U.S. peace talks, The New York Times said. At its current rate, Moscow would need “more than three decades to seize full control of the Donbas.”

Hungary’s ousting of longtime Prime Minister Viktor Orbán this month sent shockwaves across Europe and beyond. In Moscow, Hungary under Orbán had been a rare ally amid an adversarial EU. In Kyiv, Orbán’s intransigence had scuttled various European initiatives to aid Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s government in the country’s with Russia. But with Orbán out, Hungary will seemingly focus on repairing and normalizing EU ties. Ukraine stands to benefit from this emerging era in Eastern Europe, even as it faces a host of risks.

What did the commentators say?

Over the past four years of war with Russia, Hungary has been a “persistent source of irritation” for Ukraine, The New York Times said. Orbán’s government “maintained friendly relations” with Vladimir Putin’s Kremlin while “blocking critical European Union funding” for Kyiv’s war effort and “stalling Ukraine’s path toward integration into the bloc.” Orbán’s ousting means “this sort of Trojan horse for Russia within the EU may disappear,” said Andreas Umland, a policy fellow with the European Policy Institute in Kyiv, to the Times.

Orbán’s “vociferous recalcitrance” toward Ukraine allowed him to cast himself as “virtually the only opponent of aid to Ukraine in the entire EU,” said the Carnegie Russia Eurasia Center. “In reality,” Orbán was “simply willing to wield his veto and absorb all the backlash,” allowing other antagonists to “remain in the shadows.”

The victory of Hungary’s incoming Prime Minister Péter Magyar “clears the way for greater European support for Ukraine,” said the Council on Foreign Relations. Already, that shift has seen Hungary lift a hold it placed on a 90 billion euro loan to Kyiv, which Orbán coupled with what he claimed was Ukraine’s destruction of the Druzhba oil pipeline (Ukraine contends the pipeline was damaged in a Russian strike). The “spat” over the Druzhba pipeline also blocked a round of Russian sanctions the EU had hoped to “adopt to mark the fourth anniversary” of Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine in late February of this year, the CBC said.

With Orbán’s hold lifted, Ukraine is expected to make short work of the initial EU loan payments, the first of which are supposed to arrive in Kyiv “as soon as next month,” said The Telegraph. To date, Ukraine has been “reliant on donations from allies to plug the gap left by the Hungarian veto” and will use the newly released funds toward “U.S.-made Patriot air-defense interceptors to protect against incoming Russian ballistic missiles, new-fangled drone technologies produced in Ukraine and other legacy weapons, such as British Storm Shadow missiles.”

Ukraine is also taking Orbán’s ousting as an “opening to expand its energy footprint in Europe and displace Russian crude oil in Eastern Europe,” said Politico’s E&E News. Ukraine’s state-owned Naftogaz oil company is “eying plans to ship about 100 million barrels of oil a year” from a Black Sea port to neighboring countries, including Hungary, which could “supplant the Russian deliveries.”

What next?

Although the “dramatic change in tone” from Hungary is “certainly encouraging,” Ukrainians are “well aware that Hungary is not likely to become a major supporter,” said the Atlantic Council. Incoming Hungarian leadership has already “ruled out” arming Ukraine and “underlined” opposition to “fast-tracking the country’s EU accession process.”

While Magyar is “expected to take conciliatory steps toward Ukraine,” said the Russia Eurasia Center, “expectations may be overstated.” Ukraine’s inclusion in the EU is “increasingly unpopular in the bloc’s eastern part,” where countries like Poland and Bulgaria see Kyiv as a “direct competitor for European subsidies, jobs and agricultural markets.” Ukraine is also seen by some of its neighbors as an “obstacle to accessing Russian energy supplies.”

Removing Hungary’s vetoes on Ukrainian aid improves the EU’s “decision-making capacity,” said Zsuzsanna Végh, an analyst at the German Marshall Fund think tank, to The Telegraph. But Hungary won’t contribute to the EU funds directly, as Magyar’s Tisza party is “unlikely to embrace expansive military support.”

Ukrainians saw Orbán as the “hostile actor,” said Kyiv Independent reporter Tim Zadorozhnyy to the Lowy Institute, “not Hungary itself.” With Magyar’s promises of eased tensions and EU backing, he “now has all the cards in his hands.”

With the Russo-Ukrainian War in its fourth year, both sides are dealing with critical troop shortages, and Ukrainian officials think they’ve found a solution. The country has started using remotely controlled robots in combat to account for these shortages and also reduce casualties. But some experts are also downplaying the effect these robots could have on the war.

‘Seize Russian positions solely with automated weapons’

The robots, which often feature mounted machine guns, can “help Ukrainian troops carry gear, lay mines, evacuate the wounded and attack Russian positions,” said Business Insider. At least 280 companies are working to develop these robots, many of which are used to transport ordnance because they can “carry more than roughly 10 servicemen can,” Oleksandr Yabchanka, the head of robotic systems for Ukraine’s Da Vinci Wolves army regiment, told Business Insider.

The robots are a key part of Ukraine’s fight because of their offensive capabilities. One video during combat, filmed last summer, showed several Ukrainian robots that “each carried 66 pounds of explosives,” said The New York Times. One of these robots drove into a Russian stronghold and “blew itself up, while the others held back, monitoring the position.” Several Russian soldiers surrendered, and these kinds of attacks show “that the Ukrainian military can now seize Russian positions solely with automated weapons.”

Of course, human soldiers remain the key demographic on the battlefield, but Ukraine is “eager to highlight its advances to show Western partners that its outnumbered army can stay in the fight,” said the Times, while also promoting the country’s “homegrown defense industry.” During the first three months of 2026, Ukraine’s ground robots “carried out more than 22,000 missions on the front lines,” said Business Insider, citing data from Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

‘The reality is more nuanced and far less futuristic’

There are drawbacks to using robots, as they “can still fall prey to enemy drones and also face challenges in traversing battle-scarred landscapes,” said Ars Technica. Though they may be good for frontline combat, at least one Ukrainian battalion reported that robots “attempting to evacuate wounded soldiers failed to reach the positions in four out of five cases due to complicating factors.” Ukraine’s efforts are also in “competition with the Russian military, which has similarly increased its use of robots on the frontlines.”

The narrative has largely been that Ukrainian robots will eventually supersede most of the country’s soldiers, but the “reality is more nuanced and far less futuristic,” said the Kyiv Post. The expansion of these battlefield robots is mostly part of an effort to “support troops not replace them.” And even though the stories of killer robots dominate the headlines, much of the “work performed by these robots remains logistical,” encompassing the delivery of “supplies, including food, ammunition, water and equipment, to frontline positions.”

But even non-offensive missions using robots “can save lives, as they replace tasks that would otherwise require soldiers to move on foot under fire,” a senior operator of ground robotic systems from Ukraine’s 13th Brigade told the Kyiv Post. It remains “far better to send a robot on a mission. If it is destroyed, you lose equipment. But if you send two or three soldiers and they are killed, it is a much greater loss, both emotionally and for the unit’s combat capability.”

There are only so many weapons to go around. The United States is waging war on Iran, and some observers are concerned the massive expenditure of munitions will make it more difficult to supply Ukraine in its war against Russia.

Conflict in the Middle East may deprive Ukraine of weapons to “defend itself from Russia’s bombardment,” said The Wall Street Journal. The intensity of the U.S. war on Iran “will affect the amount of air defense we receive,” said Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, and the “sudden depletion” of air defense munitions will make it more challenging to “credibly project U.S. power against Russia in Ukraine,” said Time magazine. America’s “resources and supplies are limited,” said Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.). That has raised concerns in Kyiv, said Time. “Everyone understands that the right weapons are our lifeline,” Zelenskyy said.

The Iran war “could save Vladimir Putin’s failing Ukraine invasion,” said The Atlantic Council. Russia “stands to benefit more than most” from the surge in oil and gasoline prices caused by the war in Iran, which could also “distract the Trump administration” from its efforts to mediate a peace deal between Moscow and Kyiv. Putin “will now likely be able to breathe a little easier” while the U.S. is distracted.

What did the commentators say?

The “obvious truth” is that Ukraine’s struggle is “not a priority for the White House,” Bohdan Nahaylo said at the Kyiv Post. The Iran war also increases pressure on Europe, which now must “deal with instability in two important areas simultaneously.” European energy markets that “had just stabilized after cutting off Russian supplies” have been thrown into renewed turmoil. That will create new challenges for a continent already “stretched thin” by its backing of Ukraine. The newest crisis will be a “test of Europe’s ability to remain focused and united.”

War in the Middle East “offers Russia several opportunities,” Stefan Wolff said at The Conversation. The oil shock gives Moscow a “new lifeline for financing its ongoing war” while the diversion of U.S. arms to Iran gives Putin an advantage in his “relentless campaign of missile and drone strikes” on Ukraine. The war in Iran will not give Russia a victory in Ukraine, “but it has thrown the world into additional turmoil for no good reason.” That will delay a “much-needed restoration of peace” for a war-weary Europe.

What next?

President Donald Trump is “looking to Ukraine to help its operations against Iran,” said Politico. Zelenskyy’s government has extensive experience with the kind of drone warfare at the center of the Iran conflict, making Ukraine a “world leader” in the kind of “anti-drone defenses” that the U.S. needs right now. The Ukrainian leader said the country would help as long as that assistance “didn’t weaken its own defenses.” Doing so may give Ukraine leverage with Trump: Assistance to the U.S. “serves as an investment in our diplomatic capabilities,” Zelenskyy said.

“Vladimir Putin has not achieved his goals,” said a defiant Volodymyr Zelenskyy in a televised address marking the fourth anniversary of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

The February 2022 invasion was meant to be a “short and successful military operation” that would “force Kyiv back into Moscow’s orbit” and “overturn the entire post-Cold War security architecture in Europe”, said the BBC’s Russia editor, Steve Rosenberg. “It didn’t go to plan”, leaving Russia with an ever-mounting cost.

What did the commentators say?

As the conflict enters its fifth year, Russian victory seems as far away as ever and it has little to show for its estimated 1.2 million casualties, according to Seth G. Jones and Riley McCabe at the Center for Strategic & International Studies. The average pace of Russia’s progress has sometimes been as little as 15 metres per day, “slower than almost any major offensive campaign in any war in the last century”.

Russia’s economy is finally starting to teeter. It faces a huge shortfall in oil revenues and has been forced to sell gold reserves to cover its budget deficit.

The West has always believed that domestic discontent as a result of the ongoing sanctions would “persuade Putin to abandon the war”, said Peter Rutland and Elizaveta Gaufman on The Conversation. This, in turn, was “based on the assumption that the legitimacy of Putinism rests on a social contract” that offers Russians stability and income in exchange for loyalty.

But this approach “tends to downplay the role of ideology”, which has been successfully exploited by the Kremlin to spin the war as an existential threat and maintain support for the president, according to data from Statista.

This narrative has also been deployed externally, towards Russia’s opponents. The idea emanating from the Kremlin that Ukraine’s front line faces “imminent collapse” is “an effort to coerce the West and Ukraine into capitulating to Russian demands that Russia cannot secure itself militarily”, said the Washington-based Institute for the Study of War. This is a “false narrative”.

The West should “stop buying into Moscow’s bluff that Russia is invincible” and “use the Kremlin’s weaknesses and double down on its support for Ukraine to bring about real negotiations to end the war”, said Jana Kobzova and Leo Litra for the European Council on Foreign Relations.

“The notion that ‘time is on the Russian side’ betrays a lack of strategic patience and, even more importantly, squandered opportunities to exploit Moscow’s growing structural vulnerabilities.”

What next?

“Standard economic theory suggests that deteriorating conditions should push the Kremlin towards negotiations on ending the war,” said The Economist. “A rational actor facing mounting costs seeks an exit.”

Yet there is little sign that Putin has any intention of yielding on his push for the “capitulation” of Ukraine, Russian political scientist Tatiana Stanovaya told The I Paper. If no peace deal can be struck, the war could even “escalate further”, with the possible involvement of China a “growing factor”, as well as fears of a “new nuclear race”, said The i Paper.

Russia can “probably continue waging war for the foreseeable future”, said The Economist, but every additional year “raises systemic risk: of fiscal crisis, of institutional breakdown, of damage so severe that no post-war policy can repair it”.

So the question for Western allies is “what kind of Russia will emerge” when its appetite for war finally fades, “and whether anyone has a plan for what comes next”.

Delegations from the US, Ukraine and Russia have met together for the first time since Moscow launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine nearly four years ago, buoying hopes of a peace deal despite continued sticking points over territory.

Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov told reporters that talks overnight between Vladimir Putin and the US had been “substantive, constructive and very frank”, ahead of the two-day summit in Abu Dhabi. But despite the positive noises, Russia, which occupies about 20% of Ukraine, “is pushing for full control of the country’s eastern Donbas region as part of a deal”, something Kyiv has warned against, claiming that “ceding ground would embolden Moscow”, said The Times.

What did the commentators say?

US envoy Steve Witkoff said negotiations were “down to one issue”, suggesting an agreement was perhaps within reach. “I think we’ve got it down to one issue, and we have discussed iterations of that issue, and that means it’s solvable,” he said.

While Donald Trump and his colleagues “appear to believe Putin is ready and willing to agree to a ceasefire”, said CNBC, Ukraine remains sceptical, believing “Russia’s manpower advantage on the battlefield and incremental advances means it is willing to continue the war and is playing for time by drawing out talks”. Coupled with this “it isn’t clear that the meetings on Ukraine this week come with any new proposals beyond those that have already been rejected by Russia”, said Politico’s Felicia Schwartz.

From Ukraine’s perspective, “these first, trilateral talks are a kind of crunch time”, said Sarah Rainsford, the BBC’s Eastern Europe correspondent. “The focus will be US security guarantees for Ukraine – and, as Volodymyr Zelenskyy puts it, it’s a chance to see whether Moscow is really serious about peace or just playing games.”

The crux of that issue is that for Putin “deception is the default setting”, said The Hill’s Andrew Chakhoyan. “He does not negotiate – he manipulates.” As former Ukrainian commander Valerii Zaluzhnyi wrote in the New York Post: “Russia’s negotiators, like its generals, fight to exhaust, confuse and divide. Their aim is not peace but delay; not compromise in pursuit of accord but conquest through deception.”

“It feels like we've been here before: highly anticipated high-profile summits that change little on the ground in Ukraine,” said Sky News’s Sally Lockwood. “And yet – this time feels different.” The speed at which all three sides agreed to meet in the UAE means there is “a sense that neither side would have shown up without at least contemplating a compromise they might be willing to accept”.

What next?

The timing of these talks “is especially significant as Ukraine faces its harshest winter of the war, with widespread power outages caused by Russian strikes on energy infrastructure”, said Modern Diplomacy. But while these conditions “add urgency to negotiations” they also “fuel Ukrainian scepticism about Russia’s stated interest in peace”.

Along with the trilateral talks in Abu Dhabi, separate economic discussions between Moscow and Washington are also planned, signalling parallel diplomatic tracks.

It’s there where the US can really turn the screw. “The first step to defeating Russian cognitive warfare is simple: stop playing by Russia’s dirty rules,” said The Hill’s Chakhoyan. “Stop accepting Putin’s framing.” Putin lies “because his only path to victory runs through Washington’s self-deterrence and Europe’s indecisiveness. The greatest lie of all is that we have no choice but to accept it.”

“The man without a smile”, they call him, said Meduza (Riga). Known for his cold stare and for surviving ten assassination attempts, Kyrylo Budanov, until this month the head of Ukraine’s military intelligence service (HUR), is renowned for daring operations against the Russians – the bomb attacks on the bridge to Russia-occupied Crimea, for example. Just after Christmas, he even tricked Russian spooks into handing over half a million dollars in bounty money for the killing of the general of a pro-Ukraine Russian militia, a death the HUR had faked.

Major shake-up

He’s a popular figure in Ukraine; some polls show he’s more trusted than President Zelenskyy. Last week, relieving him of his spymaster duties, Zelenskyy made him chief of staff. That decision marks a “tectonic shift” in Ukrainian politics, said Jamie Dettmer on Politico (Brussels). The man he has replaced, in a major shake-up of top officials, is Andriy Yermak, who was such a close confidant of Zelenskyy’s that he was “virtually a co-president”. But he was also mired in an energy corruption scandal, and for too long the “stubborn” Zelenskyy had resisted calls for his sacking.

It was a bold, albeit belated, move on the president’s part, said Pavlo Vuets in Glavkom (Kyiv). Yermak, who had no love for Budanov and tried to get him sacked as spy chief, had “consciously absorbed all the negativity that fell on the presidential mantle”. Budanov has no such inclinations: indeed, he no doubt hopes to replace Zelenskyy should an election be held in the near future.

‘Renewed lustre’

It’s actually a smart move on the president’s part, said Tadeusz Iwanski on Polskie Radio (Warsaw). Appointing the highly popular Budanov to lead his team will bring “renewed lustre” to Zelenskyy, whose approval ratings have been sliding. Budanov’s rise bodes well for Ukraine’s prospects in peace talks, too. He’s well liked by the Americans, who view him as a credible negotiator, untainted by corruption and more willing than Yermak to make the needed compromises as Ukraine struggles with troop shortages, renewed attacks on its energy infrastructure, and pressure from Donald Trump to agree terms with the Kremlin.

Some senior Ukrainians see Budanov’s elevation as the start of “Operation Successor”, said Roman Romaniuk in Ukrainska Pravda (Kyiv). Yet it’s hasty to assume that Zelenskyy is heading for the exit. For a start, he has cut his protégé off from his base in HUR by choosing a Yermak ally as his successor as spy chief. Yes, Zelenskyy is happy to let Budanov become a serious political player, but only if “he plays strictly within Zelenskyy’s own team”.

A peace deal in Ukraine means more than ending the fighting now. Volodymyr Zelenskyy wants to ensure Russia does not invade his country again. The only way that can happen, he says, is if the United States guarantees Ukraine’s defense in — and against — any future war.

Zelenskyy is hoping for “security guarantees from the United States that could span up to 50 years” as part of any peace agreement with Russia, said USA Today. The Ukrainian leader wants President Donald Trump to “consider a longer commitment” than the 15-year guarantee he has reportedly approved. “Realistically, this war will not end” without a defense commitment, said Zelenskyy. Trump, who has been eager to extricate the U.S. from its backing of Ukraine, vowed any pledge would heavily involve “Kyiv’s allies in Europe,” said The Wall Street Journal. “There will be a security agreement, it’ll be a strong agreement and the European nations are very much involved,” Trump said Sunday.

Protecting Ukraine against another war

A peace deal involving “international security guarantees” appears to be coming into view, David Ignatius said at The Washington Post. Despite Trump’s “inexplicable sympathy” for Russia, the president’s team appears to recognize that any peace proposal will fail “unless Zelenskyy can sell it to a brave but exhausted country.” That means the plan must include measures to protect Ukraine against future invasion, as well as support for the country’s “future economic prosperity.” Without those elements, the American leader will not get the peace deal he so clearly wants. “Trump should make a reasonable deal that will last.”

Trump must “avoid promising to fight a direct war with Russia” to defend Ukraine, Andrew Day said at The American Conservative. It is surprising that Trump appears ready to “extend America’s superpower shield” to Ukraine after he “slashed U.S. funding for Ukraine’s war effort” and blasted Zelenskyy as a “manipulative ingrate.” But the president’s “notorious fixation on getting a deal” has taken priority. The challenge: Russia will oppose any “military partnership” between Ukraine and the West. Trump should instead push for an “armed non-alignment” model that leaves Kyiv prepared to “deter — but not threaten — Russia.”

Another brutal year?

Europe’s commitment to increasing its financial and military support may make Trump more amenable to backing Ukraine’s play, Holman W. Jenkins, Jr. said at The Wall Street Journal. The president is “drawn to teams that are winning and mobilizing resources on their own” because that lets him “step in and take credit for their success.”

The question now is whether Putin “will tolerate a deal that safeguards Ukraine’s sovereignty,” Comfort Ero and Richard Atwood said at Foreign Policy. Putin’s war demands include “limits on the Ukrainian military’s size and foreign support,” and most European observers believe he wants a “pliant government” in Kyiv that is “shorn of a strong deterrent” against Moscow’s power. That would seem to weigh against his acceptance of U.S. security guarantees. For now, the “likeliest scenario next year is a continued brutal slog at the front.”

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy raised both eyebrows and hopes across Eastern Europe this week after offering a surprising concession in the fraught negotiations to end Russia’s ongoing invasion. He told reporters on Tuesday that he would be willing to pull troops from parts of the contested Donbas region that Ukraine shares with Russia to establish an internationally monitored demilitarized zone, so long as Moscow does the same with the territory it controls in the area. Donbas, Zelenskyy said, is the “most difficult point” in negotiations to end the war between both nations.

‘Thorny territorial disputes’

Zelenskyy’s openness to a Donbas demilitarized zone comes as part of a “revised 20-point peace plan” crafted by American and Ukrainian negotiators that “covers a broad range of issues,” The New York Times said. The blueprint outlines everything from “potential territorial arrangements” to “security guarantees” and plans for rebuilding areas damaged in the war. Zelenskyy’s Donbas comments are the “closest” the Ukrainian leader has come to addressing the “thorny territorial disputes” that have “repeatedly derailed peace talks” in the region. Russia, which occupies the majority of the Donbas region, has “insisted that Ukraine relinquish” what remaining territory it controls in the area in an “ultimatum that Ukraine has rejected,” said The Associated Press.

Donbas has emerged as one of the “chief sticking points” in the current peace plan, with Kyiv afraid that “surrendering fortified positions” across the region might help Russia to “stage further attacks,” The Wall Street Journal said. The United States has pushed for a “compromise” over the area by encouraging the development of a “free economic zone” in the demilitarized territory.

In his remarks Tuesday, Zelenskyy “stressed that Ukraine is against the withdrawal,” Politico said. But “there are two options,” said Zelenskyy: “Either the war continues, or something will have to be decided regarding all potential economic zones.” The significance of his concession notwithstanding, it remains “difficult to imagine Russia accepting such terms,” considering how controlling the contested region has been “one of its main war objectives,” said Le Monde.

Referendum and nuclear problem

Beyond tactical fears of renewed Russian aggression in the region, Ukraine must also contend with “humanitarian concerns related to the relocation of residents” and the risk of a “serious blow to national morale” should it give up significant territory, the Times said. Accordingly, any demilitarized zone will need to be “approved by Ukrainians through a referendum.” The proposed peace plan also calls for a “joint U.S.-Ukrainian-Russian management” of Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, “Europe’s largest,” currently under Russian control, said CBS News. Zelenskyy has stressed, however, that Ukraine “doesn’t want any Russian oversight of the facility.”

It is “now up to the Russian Federation to respond to this proposed agreement,” said Le Monde. To that end, Zelenskyy predicted, Moscow will be “ready to accept a plan in any case.”

“They can’t say to President Trump: ‘Listen, we’re against a peaceful settlement,’” Zelenskyy explained at his press briefing. “If they try to block everything, President Trump will then have to arm us heavily, while imposing every possible sanction on them.” In response to Ukraine’s apparent territorial flexibility, Russian President Vladimir Putin told a gathering of top Russian businessmen that a “partial exchange of territories from the Russian side is not ruled out,” said Russia's Kommersant newspaper, per Reuters. “In essence,” said the news service, “Putin wants the whole of Donbas” but is open to other territorial swaps “outside that area.”

What happened

The Trump administration offered Ukraine “NATO-like Article 5” security guarantees if it agrees to a peace deal with Russia, a senior U.S. official told reporters Monday night, after two days of high-level talks in Berlin. But “those guarantees will not be on the table forever.” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and other European leaders who attended the talks welcomed the U.S. guarantees, but all sides acknowledged significant differences over demands that Ukraine give up territory Russia has failed to seize in battle.

Who said what

“I think we’re closer now than we have been, ever,” President Donald Trump, who called into the Berlin meeting, told reporters Monday night. Negotiators solved probably “90% of the issues between Ukraine and Russia,” the U.S. official told reporters, and Trump “believes he can get Russia to accept” the “NATO-like” guarantee and European Union membership for Ukraine. The official did not give specifics on the U.S. guarantees but said they “would have to go before the Senate.”

The Trump team argues that the “bitter pill of massive territorial concessions” in the Donbas would be palatable to Ukraine if served up with “robust security guarantees,” an accelerated path into the EU and “billions on the table for rebuilding,” Axios said. But Ukrainian officials and their European allies “are wary that Ukraine could agree to make painful concessions, only for Russia to balk at the deal and hold out for more.”

“Moscow has yet to agree to any of the changes discussed in Germany and has not indicated any willingness to do so,” Reuters said. Still, Trump’s “unprecedented offer” for security guarantees has “sparked some optimism from European leaders” about a pathway to peace.

What next?

More talks are expected this weekend “somewhere in the United States, could be Miami, with working groups, military people, looking at maps,” a U.S. official told reporters. “It was not clear when or how the Trump administration would bring the new details to Moscow,” Politico said. Trump and his team “have said they hope to achieve a peace deal by the end of the year,” The Washington Post said, but Ukrainian and European officials view that as “ambitious.” Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov, asked Monday about a proposed Christmas ceasefire, said predicting a time frame for a Ukraine peace deal was a “thankless task.”

The stakes couldn’t be higher this weekend as the UK and the EU attempt to win concessions from the US over a peace deal between Ukraine and Russia.

Depending on how the next few days play out, “in the very best scenario there could eventually be peace in Ukraine”, said The Times. But in the worst-case scenario for the UK and the EU, “President Trump cuts Ukraine and Europe loose and sides with Moscow in his desire to bring the conflict to an end at any price”.

Yesterday, White House spokesperson Karoline Leavitt said Trump is “extremely frustrated with both sides of this war”, and he is “sick of meetings just for the sake of meeting”. In essence, “the transatlantic relationship feels very fragile right now,” a senior government source told The Times. “Anything could happen.”

What did the commentators say?

Despite Trump’s frustrations, “signs of a potential compromise are emerging”, said Politico’s London Playbook. The US and Ukraine are now talking about Kyiv withdrawing its troops from the Donbas region in order to create a “free economic zone” which would also be protected from Russian forces. “Ukraine seems willing to engage on this, but says it will only withdraw if it receives meaningful security guarantees.”

But reports of a demilitarised zone (DMZ) such as this “must be taken with a pinch of salt”, said UnHerd’s Wolfgang Munchau. “There are some suggestions that a DMZ would be a dealbreaker for Russia, like Nato Article 5 security guarantees for Ukraine.” Equally, Trump’s tilt toward the Kremlin in the National Security Strategy released by the White House last week has complicated negotiations. The US president “seems to want to stand equidistant between a democratic Europe and an autocratic Russia”, said The Washington Post’s David Ignatius. But “that evenhandedness between friend and foe makes no sense, strategically or morally – and it genuinely worries Europe.”

Trump “still views Ukraine as the weaker, more malleable party in the conflict”, two US government sources told Politico. “The Americans continue to act as though accepting Russia’s demand to hand over territory it has failed to occupy will bring peace,” said The Economist. But “all the evidence suggests Vladimir Putin sees it as a means to achieve Ukraine’s political subjugation”.

Indeed, many countries “remain concerned that a lopsided peace deal could work in Moscow’s favour, and prelude further aggression in Ukraine or against Nato’s long eastern flank”, said the National Security Journal’s Georgia Gillholy. European leaders “see little evidence that the Kremlin”, with more than 700,000 troops and its vast defence industry still geared for conflict, “is preparing for anything resembling a genuine de-escalation”.

What next?

According to officials from two of the countries involved, Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff intends to take part in talks with national security officials from the UK and Europe this weekend.

One senior government source told The Times that developments in recent days had been “very significant” and that there was now at least a chance of achieving a unified “Western” set of proposals to present to Moscow.

But whether that means peace before Christmas is very much up in the air. Kremlin foreign policy aide Yuri Ushakov said ahead of the discussions this weekend that Moscow has not seen the revised peace plan – and that “when we see them, we may not like a lot of things, that’s how I sense it”.

After days of frantic diplomacy, Donald Trump claimed this week that his negotiators had made “tremendous progress” towards ending the Ukraine War. The Ukrainian leadership indicated that it had accepted the “core terms” of a US-backed peace plan – and Trump said that his envoy, Steve Witkoff, would be dispatched to the Kremlin for talks with Vladimir Putin next week. However, significant doubts remained, both about the exact terms of the deal, and about Russia’s position. On Wednesday, Russian officials indicated that the deal was not acceptable.

Last week, Trump had piled great pressure on Kyiv to sign up to a 28-point plan that the US had drawn up following Witkoff’s talks with Russian envoys in Miami. That proposal echoed Moscow’s maximalist war aims, by calling for Kyiv to cede the rest of the Donbas region, and to limit its army to 600,000 personnel. It caused alarm among Ukraine’s European allies, whose 19-point counter-proposal is believed to form the basis of the deal Kyiv later accepted.

Pro-Russia bias

Effectively, the US-Russia peace plan amounted to a demand for Ukraine’s “outright surrender”, said The Times. It would have handed over Ukraine’s “fortress belt” in the Donbas, which it has spent years defending, and denied it meaningful security guarantees. If Zelenskyy had bowed to Trump’s ultimatum to agree to its terms by Thanksgiving, 27 November, or lose access to US weapons and intelligence, he’d surely have had to resign.

This peace plan was reportedly leaked by Moscow, said The Economist – and AI analysis suggests it was translated from the original Russian. Either way, it again “betrayed” Trump’s pro-Russia bias, and his indifference to Ukraine; as did his dismissive suggestion that Zelenskyy can “fight his little heart out” if no deal is struck, and his grousing on social media that “UKRAINE ‘LEADERSHIP’ HAS EXPRESSED ZERO GRATITUDE FOR OUR EFFORTS.”

Sobering question

There was a “grim familiarity” to events last week, said The Guardian. As in August, when Trump hosted Putin in Alaska, Kyiv and its European allies had been excluded from talks which would decide their future, and were left scrambling to improve a Moscow-friendly deal.

Europe’s leaders were confronted with a sobering question, said Michael D. Shear in The New York Times: was the US about to force Ukraine to “capitulate”, to the detriment of Nato and the benefit of Putin – “all without even bothering to consult with them”? It looked that way for a while; but by Tuesday, the crisis had been averted by European leaders who have honed their “how-to-handle-Trump playbook” during a year of similar episodes. Rather than lashing out, they “embraced” the plan to keep Trump onside, while insisting that it was only a starting point for negotiations. “The goal was to slow the process and eliminate some of the provisions they saw as crossing Europe’s red lines.”

The Europeans succeeded in shrinking the 28-point plan to 19 points, said Roger Boyes in The Times. But several of Russia’s key demands remained: no Western military presence in Ukraine, no Nato membership. And the fundamental questions – how to divide the land, and security guarantees against future invasions – remained apparently unresolved. As usual with Trump’s “drive-by diplomacy”, nothing adds up.

‘Miserable choice’

With the knotty questions about territory yet to be resolved, Russia is “trying to pour cold water on the prospects of an imminent peace breakthrough”, said Samuel Ramani in The Daily Telegraph. It continues to bombard Ukrainian cities; its officials have dismissed the new proposals as “not constructive”.

For Kyiv, the risk now is that Putin will talk Trump into backing favourable terms for Russia, said Tim Ross et al in Politico. That would leave Zelenskyy with a “miserable choice”: either take an offer “cooked up by Trump and Putin”, or hope that his European allies finally make good on their bold promises of help.

Sooner or later, though, he’ll have to make a deal, said Gideon Rachman in the FT. During four years of war, Ukraine has sustained hundreds of thousands of casualties. Millions of its citizens have fled abroad, and its economy lies in ruins. A bad settlement could imperil its future as a “genuinely independent” nation. But make no mistake: “the continuation of the war is also deeply damaging to Ukraine”.

It beggars belief, our country’s propensity for corruption, said Zoya Kazanzhy in Vysoky Zamok (Lviv). Even as a terrible enemy “rages, kills and destroys” our people on the battlefield, the government of our supposed protector, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, is robbing us blind at home.

‘Drastic change’

I’m talking about the vast corruption scandal revealed last week by Nabu and SAP, Ukraine’s anti-corruption agencies, which for 15 months have been investigating the financial dealings of Energoatom, the state nuclear power company. High officials involved in negotiating contracts for the company have been collecting bribes worth 10% to 15% of each contract: Nabu estimates that $100 million in kickbacks were laundered through a secret Kyiv-based office.

So far, seven people have been charged and two government ministers (for energy and justice) have resigned for their role in the scandal. The alleged mastermind of the whole plot, businessman Timur Mindich, is a long-time pal of Zelenskyy: before Zelenskyy became president, the two men were co-owners of a film company. Mindich fled to Tel Aviv on the morning of the arrests: “you don’t have to be a detective” to figure out who warned him. War or no war, “Zelenskyy must go”.

Russia’s latest strikes have targeted the very Ukrainian power plants at the centre of this scandal, said Marina Daniluk Yarmolaeva on Espreso TV (Kyiv). It is disgraceful that, while millions of us have been sitting in the cold and dark, contemplating a brutal winter, our officials have been filling their pockets with international aid donated to protect our infrastructure from attack. To Ukrainians it all feels “like something between suicide and treason”.

Ministerial resignations are not enough, said Serhiy Taran in Vysoky Zamok. Even in our ongoing state of emergency, we need “a drastic change in the culture of Ukrainian politics”, notably a return to open competition for senior roles. Government can no longer be allowed to fill these positions with business mates.

‘Clean slate’

“These are not easy times for Zelenskyy,” said Lorenzo Cremonesi in Corriere della Sera (Milan). Even as “the Russians are pushing hard on the war front, corruption scandals are weakening the domestic front”. All of this, of course, “plays into the hands of the Kremlin’s supporters”, said Gerald Schubert in Der Standard (Vienna): countries such as Hungary are “once again calling for an end to EU accession talks with Ukraine and that all funding be turned off”. We can’t allow that to happen. There is no suggestion Zelenskyy was aware of this plot, and he acted quickly to remove his energy and justice ministers, pledging a “clean slate”. And right now, “Ukraine needs the West’s support more than ever” to strengthen its democratic structures.

We saw that support used effectively this summer, when Zelenskyy’s government, under pressure from Brussels, was forced to backtrack in its attempts to restrict the independence of its anti-corruption agencies. And the success of that effort “speaks for itself”: it was Nabu that led the investigation into Energoatom. However, pressure from Brussels will only work if we encourage Ukraine in its hopes of joining the EU, “instead of snubbing the long-suffering country at every opportunity”.

But that’s the problem, said Luís Delgado in Visão (Lisbon). Much of Europe is still incredibly “uneasy” about the current situation. Although “a river of money has been flowing into Ukraine” since 2022, Kyiv’s allies have always been wary of sending it, knowing the country’s reputation for corruption and the potential for a lot of that money to go missing. Now that some of Zelenskyy’s closest confidants are implicated in the graft, urgent explanations will be needed to avoid a freeze in the flow of funds.

The worst of it is that all this is happening just as the EU is locked in a debate about lending billions in frozen Russian assets to Ukraine. It’s an ugly situation for everyone – everyone, barring Vladimir Putin. He may be the leader “of one of the most corrupt countries in the world”, but he’ll still be gloating.

For the past two years, France has been rocked by acts of vandalism and destruction at religious and cultural locations in and around Paris. Decapitated pig’s heads were left at area mosques; provocatively labeled coffins for the “French soldiers of Ukraine” were displayed around the Eiffel Tower; and in a first-of-its-kind trial this week, four Bulgarians stand accused of defacing a Holocaust memorial with red handprints in 2024. The latter case has drawn international attention due to allegations from French authorities that it and similar acts are the work of covert Russian agents hoping to sow discord in a Western power during a crucial phase of the Russo-Ukrainian war.

A reflection of 'geopolitical reality'

This week’s trial is the “very first” in a “series of legal cases” dealing with the past two years that authorities have successfully linked to “foreign interference operations,” said French security researcher Clement Renault to Agence France-Presse. Court filings in the case include “intelligence reports” that “attribute the ‘red hands’ operation” to Russia’s federal security agency, Renault said. The “red hands” case is a “rare window” into an “escalating campaign” by Russia to “destabilize France through covert influence and psychological operations,” said Politico. As a nation “with global weight but domestic vulnerabilities” making it “especially susceptible” to interference, France “presents both a prime target and a weak flank.”

The allegation of Russian manipulation operations “reflects a geopolitical reality,” said Kevin Limonier, the deputy director of Paris’ GEODE geopolitical research center, to Politico. France is the EU’s sole nuclear power and an economic powerhouse opposed to the ongoing invasion of Ukraine, so accordingly, “Russia considers France to be a serious adversary.”

This trial comes just months after British authorities sentenced six Bulgarians to up to a decade in prison for “belonging to a Russian espionage cell,” Le Monde said. Those convicted were “motivated by money” and operated “across borders in the U.K., Austria, Spain, Germany and Montenegro.” Three of the four defendants on trial this week in France were “extradited from Croatia and Bulgaria,” while a fourth is being tried in absentia on charges of “complicity for having booked accommodation and transport for the others,” said France 24.

Part of a broader destabilization campaign

For the past two years, the Paris prosecutors office has counted “nine such cases” of vandalism and destruction in connection with alleged Russian interference operations, said France 24 reporter Antonia Kerrigan on air this week. For instance, graffiti depicting the Star of David in the weeks immediately following the October 7 Hamas attack on Israel, when the “Jewish community felt particularly vulnerable,” was carried out by two Moldovan men who claimed to be “acting on orders,” said Kerrigan. A similarly targeted attack on Paris’ Javel mosque in September was likewise connected to a “group of Serbian nationals” who were suspected in a series of antisemitic incidents across the city, Politico said. “This modus operandi is identifiable,” Kerrigan said, citing suspects who are “often foreign actors, very briefly in France, often from Eastern Europe, placing suspicion firmly at Russia's door.”

These influence operations are part of a “broader strategy” by Russia, said a French intelligence report cited by prosecutors. The goal, the report said, is “dividing French public opinion or fueling internal tensions by using ‘proxies,’” which it clarifies as people who don’t work directly for foreign intelligence services but are “paid by them for ad hoc tasks via intermediaries.”

Ukraine used UK-made Storm Shadow cruise missiles to strike a Russian chemical plant on Tuesday, according to the Ukrainian military. The plant reportedly produced gunpowder, explosives and rocket fuel components for missiles and ammunition. The “outcome of the strike is being assessed”, the military said.

The attack comes after last week’s meeting at the White House in which Donald Trump told Volodymyr Zelenskyy that he was not prepared to supply Ukraine with its sought-after Tomahawk missiles, which would be capable of striking targets even further into Russia.

Even though Ukraine “has been innovating with weapons capable of reaching deeper into Russian territory”, its military still needs foreign technology to “match Russia’s more advanced missile arsenal”, said Bloomberg.

What are Storm Shadow missiles?

Developed jointly by the UK and France, long-range Storm Shadow cruise missiles, known as Scalp, can strike targets up to around 150 miles from their launch site. Their manufacturer, MBDA, says the missiles are designed to carry out high-precision attacks, making use of an advanced navigation system to evade detection.

Launched from an aircraft in most cases, the missiles fly low to the ground, below radar, at speeds that can exceed 600mph. Targets are pinpointed with an internal camera.

Storm Shadow is “considered an ideal weapon for penetrating hardened bunkers and ammunition stores”, said the BBC. Each missile costs in the region of $1 million, so they are typically deployed with “a carefully planned flurry of much cheaper drones, sent ahead to confuse and exhaust the enemy’s air defences”.

How have they been used?

The UK first gave the missiles to Ukraine in May 2023, but Keir Starmer didn’t give permission to use the weapons on targets inside Russia until November last year.

Since then, the cruise missiles have been used “against targets including military headquarters and ships”, though “operational details of their use do not always emerge”, said Sky News. The missiles are likely being operated from within Ukraine but with input from “intelligence gathered by Western surveillance planes” over international waters.

In addition to the Russia-Ukraine conflict, Storm Shadow missiles were also reported to have been used by India against Pakistan earlier this year. According to their manufacturer, they have also been used in Iraq, Libya and Syria.

How are they different from Tomahawks?

Tomahawks, the US-made missiles originally sought by Ukraine, have a much longer range than Storm Shadows so could hit targets deeper inside Russia. The most common variant of the Tomahawk can travel almost 1,000 miles at 550mph, making them difficult to detect and intercept. They have been used in combat since 1991 and “are typically launched from sea to attack targets in deep-strike missions”, said The Guardian.

Though Trump had previously indicated openness to supplying Ukraine with Tomahawks, he “changed tack” in his meeting with the Ukrainian president on Friday, said the Financial Times. “He did not want to escalate the conflict or drain US stockpiles”. The president said: “We need them too, so I don’t know what we can do about that.”

What happened

The White House Tuesday said there were “no plans” for President Donald Trump to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin “in the immediate future,” less than a week after Trump said they would meet in Budapest “within two weeks or so” for Ukraine peace talks. Trump told reporters Tuesday he didn’t “want to have a wasted meeting” with Putin or a “waste of time, so we’ll see what happens.”

Who said what

This “latest twist in Trump’s stop-and-go effort to resolve the war in Ukraine” followed a phone call between Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov that the White House called “productive,” The Associated Press said. Trump on Monday “embraced a ceasefire proposal backed by Kyiv and European leaders to freeze the conflict on the current front line,” the BBC said, but Lavrov shot that idea down Tuesday, insisting on the “complete withdrawal of Ukrainian troops” from Ukraine’s Donbas region.

The “back-and-forth is the latest example of the cycle” in which Trump “teases some kind of diplomatic breakthrough, only to be pulled back” by Putin, The New York Times said. Trump has “by turns courted the Russian leader and threatened him — but has never taken action to punish Russia in a meaningful way,” and Ukraine always “seems to lose any traction” in the process.

What next?

Trump “suggested that decisions about the meeting would be made in the coming days,” the AP said. His “hesitancy in meeting Putin will likely come as a relief to European leaders, who have accused Putin of stalling for time with diplomacy while trying to gain ground on the battlefield.”

What happened

President Donald Trump said Thursday that he and Russian President Vladimir Putin had agreed during a “very productive” phone conversation to meet in Budapest “within two weeks or so” to discuss ending the war in Ukraine. The Kremlin said Russia had requested the two-hour call, which took place as Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy was en route to Washington, D.C., for a meeting with Trump today.

Who said what

Trump said on social media that he and Putin made “great progress” during their call and would meet in Hungary’s capital “to see if we can bring this ‘inglorious’ War between Russia and Ukraine to an end.” Trump “has long courted Putin” but is becoming “increasingly critical” of the Russian leader as he flouts Trump’s Ukraine peace efforts, The Washington Post said. Thursday's call was an “opportunity for Putin to regain the initiative and promote Russian narratives” before Zelenskyy arrived and tried to persuade Trump to arm Ukraine with long-range Tomahawk cruise missiles.

“Moscow is rushing to resume dialogue as soon as it hears about Tomahawks,” Zelenskyy said on social media after arriving in D.C. Putin’s call “appeared to dim prospects” that Trump would approve the long-range missiles for Kyiv, as seemed likely earlier this week, The Wall Street Journal said. Moscow’s “long-range curveball” fits an increasingly “familiar pattern,” the BBC said: “Every time Trump grows increasingly frustrated with Putin’s intransigence over Ukraine,” the Russian leader calls and Trump “backs off his threats to apply tougher sanctions or supply more destructive weapons.”

What next?

Trump said Secretary of State Marco Rubio would meet with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov as soon as next week to lay the groundwork for the Budapest summit.

Ukraine is taking the war deep inside Russia, and it wants U.S. help to do so. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy believes American-made Tomahawk missiles could finally force Vladimir Putin into peace talks.

Tomahawk cruise missiles could reach Russian targets “far beyond any of the weapons the U.S. has provided to Kyiv until now,” said The Wall Street Journal. The Biden administration “never seriously considered” providing the weapons to Ukraine over concerns the move would “prompt a confrontation with Moscow,” but President Donald Trump has suggested he might allow it. “I’ll make a determination on that,” he told reporters on Wednesday.

Ukraine believes the missiles would give it the capability to hit Russian “military targets and energy facilities” thanks to their 1,000-mile range, said The Hill. Kyiv is already using drones to hit enemy oil refineries far from the front lines, but the U.S. weapons would “do even more damage against them, which definitely would hurt Russia,” said military analyst Emil Kastehelmi. Moscow has been “scathing” about the prospect, said CNBC. Introducing Tomahawks into the conflict would be “truly a serious escalation,” said a Kremlin spokesman.

What did the commentators say?

“Putin has no intention of voluntarily giving up his campaign against Ukraine,” said Marc Thiessen at The Washington Post. But Trump could force him to the negotiating table by furnishing the Tomahawks and “imposing unsustainable military and financial costs on Russia.” The U.S. should ignore Moscow’s talk of “escalation.” Russia, after all, has fired more than 2,400 cruise missiles into Ukraine since the start of the war. “It would be a proportional response to Putin’s escalation.”

The question is “whether Russia’s latest threats deserve to be taken seriously,” said Peter Dickinson at The Atlantic Council’s blog. Moscow has repeatedly warned of reprisals against U.S. weapons support for Ukraine, “only to then do nothing when these red lines are subsequently crossed.” Putin has managed to limit support for Ukraine by “exploiting the West’s collective fear of escalation.” Sending Tomahawks to Kyiv could mark an “important turning point in the biggest European war since World War II.”

“Getting the Tomahawks is one thing — using them is another,” said Leo Chiu at Kyiv Post. Complex “launch platforms and guidance expertise” are required to actually operate the missiles, which means the proposed deal would be “largely symbolic” unless accompanied by Pentagon support. The unanswered question: “Would Kyiv be able to use the missiles if the transfer comes to fruition?”

What next?

Trump might be “bluffing” by considering Zelenskyy’s request, said The New York Times. It might also be a sign of his “growing frustration” with Putin for not doing more to end the war. The Russian leader “just doesn’t want to end that war, and I think it’s making him look very bad,” the president said this week. One ominous sign for Ukraine was that Trump announced Thursday he will meet Putin in Hungary for more talks on the war.

What happened

President Donald Trump recently approved providing Ukraine with intelligence for missile strikes on energy infrastructure deep inside Russia, The Wall Street Journal and Reuters reported Wednesday, citing U.S. officials. Trump is also considering Kyiv’s request for long-range Tomahawk missiles capable of hitting those power stations, refineries and pipelines providing oil and revenue to fuel Moscow’s war, Vice President J.D. Vance confirmed earlier this week.

Who said what

Trump signed off on allowing U.S. intelligence and the Pentagon to aid in Ukraine’s long-range energy strikes “shortly before” he “vented his frustration” with Russian President Vladimir Putin last week in a social media post that said Ukraine could win back all its territory, the Journal said. It was Trump’s “first known policy change” on the conflict since he began “hardening his rhetoric toward Russia in recent weeks,” Reuters said.

With Trump’s efforts to nudge Putin into peace talks going nowhere, he has been focusing on Russia’s oil and gas revenue, hitting India with steep tariffs for buying Moscow’s discounted oil and pressuring Europe and Turkey to stop purchasing Russian energy. Providing U.S. targeting intelligence, “combined with more powerful weapons, could have a far more potent effect” on degrading Russia’s energy infrastructure than Ukraine’s previous drone and missile strikes inside the country, the Journal said.

Inside Russia, where the Ukraine war “could soon outlast even the nation-molding Soviet struggle against Adolf Hitler,” there are “signs that the Russian public just want it to be over,” Politico said. In response, the Kremlin is “doubling down that Russia’s the victim, and that fragile Western nations are quivering in the face of Russian might.”

What next?

U.S. officials are “awaiting written guidance from the White House before sharing the necessary intelligence,” the Journal said, and “no decision” has been made on providing Ukraine with Tomahawk or Barracuda missiles. Kyiv has “developed its own long-range missile named the Flamingo,” Reuters said, “but quantities are unknown as the missile is in early production.”

What happened

Moldova’s ruling Party of Action and Solidarity (PAS) Sunday won an outright majority of seats in pivotal parliamentary elections, keeping the former Soviet Russian satellite country on track to join the European Union within five years. According to uncertified results this morning, President Maia Sandu’s pro-EU PAS won 50.1% of the vote, versus 24.2% for the Moscow-aligned Patriotic Electoral Bloc.

Who said what

The election had “taken on outsize global importance,” because while Moldova is a “tiny nation of 2.4 million,” its location “wedged between Romania and Ukraine” makes it “strategically important” to the Ukraine war, The New York Times said. Sandu’s government warned throughout the tense campaign that Russia was meddling, spending hundreds of millions of dollars to buy votes and on a massive disinformation effort.

Moldova applied to join the EU after Russia invaded Ukraine, and last fall voters narrowly approved EU membership in a referendum and reelected Sandu to a second term. “In both cases, ballots from the hundreds of thousands of Moldovans living abroad — many in EU countries — were critical in swinging the result,” Politico said.

What next?

Maintaining its parliamentary majority keeps PAS from “having to form a coalition that would have most likely been unstable and would have slowed down the pace of reforms to join the EU,” Oakland University international relations professor Cristian Cantir told The Associated Press. But “Moldova will continue to be in a difficult geopolitical environment characterized by Russia’s attempts to pull it back into its sphere of influence.”

What happened

President Donald Trump Tuesday sharply criticized the United Nations, renewable energy and global migration in an extended speech before the U.N. General Assembly in New York, then held more cordial meetings with world leaders. After huddling with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, Trump called Russia a “paper tiger” and said with U.S. weapons and European support, Kyiv could “fight and WIN all of Ukraine back in its original form.” He also said NATO countries should shoot down any Russian aircraft that crosses into their airspace.

Who said what

Trump’s 56-minute speech to the General Assembly — almost four times his allotted 15 minutes — “shifted from subject to subject” as he “often made unsubstantiated or contradictory claims,” The Wall Street Journal said. His lecture was “filled with grievances about ongoing wars, windmills and malfunctioning escalators,” but it was his “attacks against what he called a ‘double-tailed monster’” of immigration and “so-called green, renewable energy” that “rang loudest” as he berated fellow leaders. “I’m really good at this stuff,” Trump said. “Your countries are going to hell.”

His “head-spinning pivot” on Ukraine and Russia was what really caught everyone by surprise, though, The New York Times said. “After getting to know and fully understand the Ukraine/Russia Military and Economic situation,” Trump said on social media, Ukraine’s recovery of its “original borders” is “very much an option. Why not? Russia has been fighting aimlessly for three and a half years a War that should have taken a Real Military Power less than a week to win.” The U.S. “will continue to supply weapons to NATO for NATO to do what they want with them,” he added. “Good luck to all!”

What next?

The “strengthened support from Trump, if it sticks, is a huge win for Zelenskyy,” The Associated Press said. And Trump’s “dismissal” of Russia’s military and economic might “will hurt” President Vladimir Putin, who craves being seen as a “global player,” the BBC said. “But one should always treat Trump’s words with a pinch of salt.” This is Trump’s “hardest” stance against Moscow yet, a European Union official told Politico. “But he’s always one Putin call away from doing something not great.”

Poland has spent the past several years watching anxiously as its neighbor, Ukraine, fends off an invasion by Russia. But following an incursion into Polish airspace on Wednesday by what Prime Minister Donald Tusk described as a “huge number of Russian drones,” Warsaw has taken the rare step to invoke Article 4 of the NATO charter.

The measure calls for member nations to “consult together” and determine if the “territorial integrity, political independence or security of any of the parties is threatened.” If so, the group can then invoke NATO’s Article 5, which calls for a unified and potentially armed response.

What did the commentators say?

The drone incursion into Polish airspace has “thrust NATO’s collective defense principles into the spotlight,” said Al Jazeera. While Poland is “not quite” ready to invoke Article 5, beginning Article 4 consultations is a “political precursor” to any militarized deliberations. But, said former United Nations Deputy Secretary-General Rose Gottemoeller to NPR, Articles 4 and 5 are “separate,” and Poland's move is “not necessarily, by any means, a prelude” to a military response. Invoking Article 4 has “traditionally” been a way for member nations to “gather together quickly. The message is one of urgency.”

Russia’s “provocation” was designed to “check the mechanism of operation within NATO and our ability to react,” said Polish President Karol Nawrocki, per CNN. “Thank you, because we passed all these tests.”

Although Russia has denied responsibility for the drone incursions, the “violation last night is not an isolated incident,” said NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte on Wednesday. As the ”most serious European airspace violation by Russia since the war began,” said European Union foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas on X, “indications suggest it was intentional, not accidental.”

But Russian drones and missiles have “strayed into Polish territory” over the past few years “with no consequence,” said The Atlantic. By failing to “prepare properly for immediate threats, much less future war,” the NATO member states have demonstrated a “constant weakness,” which has in turn “emboldened Putin” by reinforcing the notion that affiliate countries have “no idea how to look after their own security.” Although the fewer than two dozen drones that breached Polish airspace were ultimately neutralized — the first time a NATO member state is “known to have fired shots in the war,” Reuters said — the incident offers “little reason for confidence” in NATO’s odds “if faced with 600 drones and missiles on a single night,” said The Atlantic.

What next?

Tusk has “pledged to push ahead” with what he called the Polish military's “great modernization program” this week, The Associated Press said. This is particularly with eyes toward the expected first delivery of U.S.-made F-35 fighter jets, which are “part of a support package of 32 aircraft that was finalized five years ago,” said Foreign Policy. Dutch-piloted F-35 jets were among the NATO forces dispatched to take down the Russian drones over Poland. But, the incident has also “brought questions about the wisdom of using advanced fighter jets” against “relatively cheap drones,” said the AP.

There is meanwhile “no time limit on how long” the Article 4 consultations should last, Reuters said. The language of the rule is “flexible enough” that it allows each member nation to determine “how far to go in responding” to an attack.

Shortly after the drone attack, Poland closed its border with Russian ally Belarus, where the Russian military is conducting “Zapad” training exercises that are “very aggressive from a military doctrine perspective,” said Tusk. The closure is expected to remain in effect through early December, with Poland also sending 40,000 troops to the border region.

The “way ahead for NATO is clear,” said Foreign Policy. It must “immediately provide Ukraine with long-range strike weapons” capable of hitting targets in deep Russia, as well as “dramatically upgrade its own defenses along its eastern border.”

There is little precedent if NATO does ultimately invoke Article 5. That cornerstone of the group’s mutual assistance pact has only been “activated once before,” Reuters said, “on behalf of the United States, in response to the September 11, 2001, hijacked-plane attacks.”

What happened

Russia fired more than 800 attack drones and 13 missiles at cities across Ukraine on Saturday night and early Sunday, in Moscow's largest aerial assault since launching its full-scale invasion in 2022. At least four people were killed, including a woman and her infant, and a main government building, in a heavily guarded section of Kyiv, was struck for the first time in the war.

Who said what

Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Svyrydenko said the fire-damaged Cabinet of Ministers building would be restored, "but lost lives cannot be returned." President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on social media that "such killings now, when real diplomacy could have already begun long ago, are a deliberate crime and a prolongation of the war." European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said the Kremlin was "mocking diplomacy."

French President Emmanuel Macron said last Thursday that 26 countries had agreed to send peacekeeping troops to Ukraine after fighting stops. Russian President Vladimir Putin responded on Friday that such European troops would be considered "legitimate targets for destruction."

What next?

President Donald Trump said "yes" last night when asked if he was ready to move to a second phase of sanctioning Russia. That's the "closest he has come to suggesting he is on the verge of ramping up sanctions against Moscow," Reuters said, though "he did not elaborate." The "latest in a series of deadlines Trump has given Putin to show progress toward peace came and went last week," The Wall Street Journal said.

What happened

Russia launched a massive attack on Ukraine Thursday, killing at least 23 people in Kyiv and damaging the European Union's diplomatic office and the nearby British Council office, along with scores of other civilian buildings.

Ukraine said it shot down most of the 598 attack drones and 31 missiles Russia fired across the country over 11 hours starting at about 3 a.m. But among the damage was a five-story residential building reduced to rubble. "As of 11 p.m. rescue efforts were still underway," Reuters said.

Who said what

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said the strike, the second-largest since Russia invaded in 2022 and the deadliest since President Donald Trump hosted Russian President Vladimir Putin to jump-start peace talks, showed that Moscow is choosing "ballistics instead of the negotiating table." It was the "clearest signal" since the summit that Putin planned to "eschew Trump's peace efforts" while "also striking a blow to the Western institutions supporting Kyiv," The Wall Street Journal said.

Trump "was not particularly perturbed" by "Putin's overnight bombardment," Politico said. He "was not happy about this move, but he was also not surprised," White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said, equating Russia's "attack on Kyiv," with Ukraine's recent "blow to Russia's oil refineries."

What next?

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said the EU was preparing a 19th sanctions package to force Putin "to the negotiating table," and vowed that European security guarantees would "turn Ukraine into a steel porcupine."

Ukraine is thought to be one of the most heavily mined countries in the world – and the problem extends way beyond its own borders.

Landmines not only pose a lethal risk to civilians, they also "block farmland, delay reconstruction and threaten commercial shipping routes", said Decode39. As Ukraine is one of the world's leading exporters of corn and wheat, many nations are urgently considering how to help demine the nation after the war ends.

What is the scale of the problem?

Long before Russia invaded in 2022, it had planted mines in Ukrainian territory. Now, a quarter of Ukraine is thought to be contaminated with explosives, said the Institute for International Political Studies – that's an area larger than England. In the past 1,000 days, more than two million landmines have been scattered on Ukrainian territory, said the US Center for European Policy Analysis.

More than six million people live in or near these hazardous areas. Incidents involving mines happen so often that "some residents don't even bother reporting them", said The Guardian. Russian drones scatter mines over the country, and retreating Russian soldiers use them to "turn the civilian roads into death traps".

More than 1,000 people have been injured and 359 killed by mines since the start of the war, according to Ukraine's emergency service. That includes at least 18 children.

What's being done about it?

Ukraine's National Mine Action Centre has produced a map that highlights areas confirmed as hazardous, or suspected of being hazardous, said Bellingcat, as well as areas that have been cleared. The information is "collated from over 80 demining groups".

The Mines Advisory Group, a UK-based charity, has been helping demine Ukraine since 2022, removing what it calls the "contamination" of war. There are "an awful lot of unexploded shells, rockets, grenades, mortars from the fighting," UN mining expert Paul Heslop told The Guardian. We are "looking at a level of complexity, of scale, that we just haven't seen before".

The Halo Trust, with 1,500 staff in Ukraine, is also helping, scrutinising satellite and drone imagery to identify pockets of landmines and explosives, and using AI algorithms to aid the search. But most of the work is still being done on the ground.

Before 2022, only men could work in explosive disposal in Ukraine, but since so many men have been drafted, it's now largely female teams checking the land on their knees, often in high heat and heavy gear. It's "like gardening on steroids", the Mines Advisory Group's Jon Cunliffe, told Prospect magazine. The teams also use specially trained dogs to sniff out TNT; each animal can cover up to 1,500 sq metres a day.

How long will it take to demine Ukraine?

"It is a staggering task," said Prospect. It will take "decades at least" to remove all the landmines from Ukraine. The Ukrainian Association of Humanitarian Demining estimates about 30 years, said Euronews, but it depends how long the war continues. "One day of war is about 30 days of demining," said one expert.

Many contaminated areas are on the front lines, making them impossible to assess, while some mines or unexploded shells are on private land or even in water. The Black Sea, for example, is littered with naval mines. Ukraine has regularly accused Russia of dropping mines from aircraft in "an attempt to disrupt commercial shipping", said RadioFreeEurope.

Since 2022, donors have pledged more than $1 billion (£744 million) for humanitarian demining, according to The Odessa Journal. But the World Bank estimates the total cost of demining Ukraine at $37 billion (£28 billion).

Are mines returning to Europe?

This summer, Ukraine announced its intention to leave the Ottowa Treaty, a landmark agreement banning anti-personnel landmines. Poland, Finland, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania have also withdrawn, blaming threats from neighbouring Russia.

The "indiscriminate nature of anti-personnel landmines" is why they were banned back in 1999, said Prospect. It was a "huge victory" that led to a 95% reduction in landmine casualties in just 15 years. That's why Ukraine's decision to "suspend" its obligations has been "met with such confusion" and "international outrage". "But for many Ukrainians, the answer is simple: Russia."

Russia, along with the US and China, never signed the treaty. As signatory states were destroying their stockpiles, Russia was "busily producing more landmines than any other country in the world", said The Telegraph, "amassing over 26 million by 2024". Now, Nato countries bordering Russia have decided that deterring invasion "requires a defensive measure that would once have been inconceivable". From the north of Finland down to eastern Poland, a "new and explosive iron curtain is about to descend across Europe".

What happened

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy Sunday marked his country's 34th Independence Day from Soviet Russia with a speech in Kyiv's central Maidan square, flanked by Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney and U.S. envoy Keith Kellogg. From Moscow, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov told NBC's "Meet the Press" that President Vladimir Putin had no plans to meet with Zelenskyy for peace talks pushed by President Donald Trump.

Who said what

"We are building a Ukraine that will have enough strength and power to live in security and peace," Zelenskyy said. "Putin can be stopped," said Carney, announcing that Canada will invest $1.5 billion (2 billion Canadian dollars) in military assistance for Ukraine. "The Russian economy is weakening. He is becoming increasingly isolated, while our alliance is growing stronger."

Norway said Sunday it was working with Germany to provide Ukraine with two more Patriot air defense systems. The Trump administration, meanwhile, "has for months been blocking Ukraine's use of long-range missiles to strike inside Russia," The Wall Street Journal said, "limiting Kyiv from employing a powerful weapon in its fight against Moscow's invasion."

What next?

"Trump thought the red carpet would impress Putin," Mykhailo Samus, the director of a Kyiv think tank, told The New York Times, but "Putin just wants to grab Ukraine and is not interested either in money or in red carpets." Russia had already "made significant concessions," Vice President J.D. Vance told "Meet the Press," including recognizing that Ukraine would have "territorial integrity" after the war and Moscow cannot "install a puppet regime in Kyiv."

What happened

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy met with President Donald Trump at the White House Monday before the two leaders were joined by the heads of NATO and key European allies who had flocked to Washington, D.C., to backstop Ukraine. All the leaders emerged upbeat, though there was little sign of tangible progress toward ending Russia's 3 1/2-year war in Ukraine.

Who said what

The "tone and style" of Zelenskyy's private meeting with Trump was "far different" from their Oval Office sit-down in February, when Zelenskyy was "hounded out of the White House," The Associated Press said. This time, Trump voiced support for guaranteeing Ukraine's security, Zelenskyy "expressed his gratitude and wore dressier clothes," and Vice President J.D. Vance "kept his mouth shut."

Monday's "cordial but inconclusive" meetings largely "focused on what security guarantees the European nations and the United States would provide Ukraine" if Zelenskyy agreed to a peace deal, The New York Times said. Trump also took 40 minutes to speak with Russian President Vladimir Putin to "begin setting up a possible direct meeting" between him and Zelenskyy, with Trump joining later.

Zelenskyy "quickly embraced" a meeting with Putin, but the "Kremlin gave a noncommittal response," The Wall Street Journal said. Ukraine's president also called Trump's signal that the U.S. would participate in securing his country's security "a major step forward." Trump said Washington would "help" the Europeans ensure security for Ukraine, and give Kyiv "very good protection and very good security," though he did not offer details. Earlier Monday, Russia's Foreign Ministry "ruled out the deployment of troops from NATO countries to help secure a peace deal," Reuters said, contradicting Trump envoy Steve Witkoff.

What next?

Secretary of State Marco Rubio will lead the "overall security guarantees coordination effort" to prepare for a Trump-Putin-Zelenskyy summit, Politico said. Zelenskyy said the guarantees "will somehow be formalized on paper within the next week to 10 days."

What happened

European and NATO leaders said Sunday they would accompany Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to the White House as he meets with President Donald Trump today following Trump's talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday. Trump went into the Alaska summit demanding that Putin agree to a ceasefire but left siding with Russia's proposal to proceed to full peace talks.

Who said what

After his disastrous meeting with Trump in February, Zelenskyy is heading to the White House "with backup," The New York Times said. The leaders of Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Finland, NATO and the European Commission "are flying in" to "make sure that a viable, defensible Ukraine survives whatever carving up of its territory is about to happen at the negotiating table."

Trump and his team initially disclosed few details about Friday's summit, but according to Reuters, sources familiar with the Kremlin's thinking said Putin proposed that "Russia would relinquish tiny pockets of occupied Ukraine and Kyiv would cede swathes of its eastern land which Moscow has been unable to capture." Trump envoy Steve Witkoff told CNN Sunday that Russia also made an important "concession": that the U.S. "could offer Article 5-like protection" to Kyiv, "which is one of the real reasons why Ukraine wants to be in NATO."

Trump last night said on social media that there was "NO GOING INTO NATO BY UKRAINE" and Zelenskyy "can end the war with Russia almost immediately, if he wants to." The Trump team's "fresh, if still vague, support for providing security guarantees" has narrowed one "gap" with Ukraine, The Wall Street Journal said, but a "chasm over Moscow’s territorial demands remains," making for "treacherous" diplomatic terrain at today's meeting.

What next?

The European leaders are "determined" to hammer out "'cast-iron' security guarantees" for Ukraine at today's meeting, the BBC said, and to ensure Trump "is not being swayed by his obvious personal rapport" with Putin "into giving in to the Russian leaders' demands."

In the build-up to the Trump-Putin summit in Alaska today, the US president has made vague references to territorial swaps – a terrifying prospect for Ukraine and its allies "given that all the territory in question" is Ukrainian, said the BBC.

Vladimir Putin is said to be demanding control of the Donbas, a region consisting of the Donetsk and Luhansk provinces. Thousands of Ukrainian soldiers have died trying to defend the Donbas, which is home to key industrial assets and millions of people, as well as being a fortified line protecting Ukrainian territory to the north and west.

Volodymyr Zelenskyy has maintained that ceding land is impossible, because Ukraine is prohibited from doing so by its constitution. But Donald Trump appears to be giving this argument short shrift. Speaking to reporters on Air Force One earlier, Trump said land swaps would be "discussed" but that ultimately the greenlight would have to come from Kyiv. "I've got to let Ukraine make that decision," he said, "and I think they'll make a proper decision."

What did the commentators say?

Zelenskyy has stood his ground, telling journalists on Tuesday: "I am not going to surrender my country, because I have no right to do so." The Ukrainian president's red lines are that Ukraine "will not hand over any of its territory", that it must be "fully involved in any negotiation" and that Kyiv must receive "security guarantees as part of any peace deal", said the Financial Times.

"I was a little bothered by the fact that Zelenskyy was saying, 'Well, I have to get constitutional approval'," Trump told reporters on Monday. "I mean, he's got approval to go into war and kill everybody, but he needs approval to do a land swap?"

More than three-quarters of Ukrainians "oppose trading land for a promise of peace", said The New York Times. Crucially, inside the military, "that figure is much, much higher," said Serhii Kuzan, chair of the Ukrainian Security and Cooperation Center. Given that Trump has previously withdrawn military support and financial aid from Ukraine, it's hard to imagine what other leverage to accept a land-swap arrangement might be on the table.

Russia and the US have reportedly discussed a "model" that "mirrors Israel’s occupation of the West Bank", whereby Russia would have military and economic control of occupied areas technically under Ukrainian sovereignty, a source told The Times. Apparently the idea was raised "weeks ago" in discussions between Steve Witkoff, Trump's peace envoy, and his Russian counterparts. The White House has denied that this is part of its plan.

For Zelenskyy, this is a juncture of "maximum pressure" domestically as well as on the battlefield, said the FT. Trump's team "are aware this is a moment of weakness for Zelenskyy", who is contending with sinking popularity at home, said former EU diplomat Balázs Jarábik. There is a danger that any agreement the president might make involving any surrender of Ukrainian territory to Russia would fail to be ratified by his parliament.

What next?

The US president called the Alaska summit a "feel-out meeting" and the White House described it as a "listening exercise", perhaps to lower expectations in case a deal is not reached.

In a call with Zelenskyy and European leaders on Wednesday, Trump apparently agreed that a ceasefire would be a prerequisite before any peace negotiations. That hasn't allayed fears that Trump and Putin will hatch a plan redrawing borders in Russia's favour and then force Ukraine to agree.

Zelenskyy has said that ceding territory, particularly in the strategically important Donbas region, would be a "springboard for a future new offensive" by Russia.

Will bringing peace to Armenia and Azerbaijan win Donald Trump a Nobel Peace Prize? What does the use of North Korean and Indian labour tell us about the Russian war economy? And why have we all gone crazy for pickles?

Olly Mann and The Week delve behind the headlines and debate what really matters from the past seven days.

A podcast for curious, open-minded people, The Week Unwrapped delivers fresh perspectives on politics, culture, technology and business. It makes for a lively, enlightening discussion, ranging from the serious to the offbeat. Previous topics have included whether solar engineering could refreeze the Arctic, why funerals are going out of fashion, and what kind of art you can use to pay your tax bill.

You can subscribe to The Week Unwrapped wherever you get your podcasts:

• Spotify
• Apple Podcasts
• Global Player

What happened

Russian forces broke through Ukrainian defenses and advanced several miles near the eastern stronghold of Pokrovsk Tuesday, an unexpected incursion widely seen as part of President Vladimir Putin's efforts to boost his bargaining position ahead of his summit with President Donald Trump in Alaska on Friday. The White House Tuesday sought to temper expectations for the summit, calling it a "listening exercise for the president."

Who said what

Trump "is agreeing to this meeting" at Putin's request, with a goal to "walk away with a better understanding of how we can end this war," White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said. When Trump announced the summit last week, the BBC said, he "sounded positive that the meeting could result in concrete steps toward peace." His "initially higher expectations" appeared to be "based in part on a misunderstanding from a meeting between his envoy, Steve Witkoff, and Putin in Moscow last week on the terms Russia might accept," The Washington Post said.

The lowering of expectations is "good news," a senior European diplomat told the Post. Ukraine and its European allies "fear that Trump, keen to claim credit for making peace and seal new business deals" with Russia, might end up rewarding Putin for "11 years of efforts to seize Ukrainian territory," Reuters said. Trump said in recent days that a peace deal would involve "some land swapping."

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy told reporters Tuesday it was "clear to us" that Putin's goal with the new offensive was to convince Trump that "Russia is moving forward, advancing, while Ukraine is losing." He reiterated that giving up Ukrainian territory was not on the table.

What next?

Zelenskyy was scheduled to participate in a video conference today with Trump and the leaders of Germany, France, Britain, Finland, Italy, Poland and NATO. All sides, the BBC said, "will try to convince Trump of the need not to be swayed by Putin when the two meet at the hastily organized summit" at a U.S. military base in Anchorage.

What happened

European leaders over the weekend presented top U.S. officials with a unified framework for President Donald Trump's scheduled Ukraine peace talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Alaska on Friday. Putin told Trump's envoy Steve Witkoff at the Kremlin last week that Russia would agree to a ceasefire if Kyiv withdrew from Ukraine's eastern Donetsk region. Ukraine's European allies said Russia needed to halt its fighting before any discussions of reciprocal land swaps.

Who said what

The European governments and Ukraine "scrambled" to "draw a common red line" after Putin's offer was clarified and Trump "let lapse his self-imposed deadline" to punish Moscow's intransigence, The Wall Street Journal said. Russian officials and commentators "crowed about landing" the Alaska summit, The Washington Post said. Trump handed Putin his first invitation to the U.S. since 2007, "apparently without the Kremlin having made any clear concessions over its war in Ukraine."

German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said it was unacceptable for any agreements to be reached "over the heads of the Europeans, over the heads of the Ukrainians." Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy reiterated that his country would not cede any land to the Russian invaders.

What next?

Vice President J.D. Vance said on Fox News Sunday that the White House was working on "scheduling and things like that" for when Putin, Trump and Zelenskyy "could sit down and discuss an end to this conflict." The U.S. ambassador to NATO, Matthew Whitaker, told CNN that Trump could still invite Zelenskyy to the Alaska summit.

Not for the first time, Donald Trump might have jumped the gun when it comes to Vladimir Putin, leaving President Zelenskyy and a mutually agreeable ceasefire in Ukraine appearing equally lost.

President Trump's hope that he can end the war in Ukraine is "impossibly optimistic", said CNN. He plans to meet the Russian president as soon as next week – although Moscow might "bristle at the rush" – and Trump told European leaders on Wednesday that he wants to follow it with a trilateral meeting between him, Putin and Zelenskyy.

But while Yuri Ushakov, a key Putin aide, confirmed that the US and Russia have "essentially reached" an agreement to hold a meeting between Putin and Trump "in the coming days", the prospect of a three-way summit looks very unlikely. "This was just something mentioned by the American side during the meeting in the Kremlin. But this was not discussed. The Russian side left this option completely without comment," said Ushakov.

What did the commentators say?

Putin's reasons for continuing the war are stronger than "any incentive Trump can give him to end it", said CNN.

Taking part in negotiations could just be a stalling tactic to buy time while Russia's summer military offensive continues to make gains in eastern Ukraine. Pressure from Trump might deliver a partial win, such as a promise to halt air attacks on civilians, but "Russian ceasefire pledges are often not worth the paper they are written on".

"The entire Putin regime is based on not just concluding this war on Russian terms but continuing to fight it … the entire economy is propped up around the war," David Salvo, a Russia expert, told CNN.

Regardless of the outcome, the mere occurrence of a meeting with Trump would "represent something of a victory" for Putin, who has largely been ostracised by Nato leaders since the Ukraine invasion, said The New York Times.

The plan reflects the US president's "deep belief that his powers of persuasion, especially in an in-person meeting, are the only way to strike a bargain". That instinct was behind Trump's attempts in his first term to negotiate with Kim Jong Un of North Korea – meetings that were "cordial and an utter failure", theatrical photo opportunities that did nothing to slow North Korea's nuclear weapons programme.

Putin could use Trump's preference for face-to-face negotiations to his advantage by manipulating Trump's eagerness for a deal to put pressure on Zelenskyy to make concessions, said The Washington Post.

While the US president signalled his impatience with Russia by punishing India with higher tariffs for buying Russian oil, they won't take effect for three weeks, which gives Russian forces more time to advance in Ukraine. A partial ceasefire could disproportionately hamper Ukraine, which relies on drones to attack key Russian military production facilities, without halting Russia's slow but steady progress on the ground.

What next?

Up for discussion at the meeting could be the fact that the Trump administration has proposed a tough new sanctions package designed to "strike at the core of Russia's war financing: its global oil exports" and a crackdown on its "shadow fleet" of ageing oil tankers that carry Russian crude to India, China and other countries, said Time. A bipartisan Senate bill seeks to impose tariffs of up to 500% on countries that continue to import Russian energy and Trump has said he is "very strongly" considering endorsing it.

If a meeting goes ahead, there are no signs that Putin would concede his unwavering demands. Trump sees himself as a great dealmaker but he has splintered so many alliances since taking office in January that Russia is now in a relatively stronger position.

"Because Donald Trump has changed so many deadlines and he's twisted one way or another, I don't think Putin takes him seriously," Nina Khrushcheva, a professor of international affairs at New York's The New School, told the BBC.

"Volodymyr Zelenskyy just betrayed Ukraine's democracy – and everyone fighting for it," said The Kyiv Independent. Last week, our president signed into law a bill that would have stripped two of the country's top anti-corruption bodies of their independence. He then backtracked, but only after thousands had taken to the streets (the first protests since Russia invaded in 2022), and after the EU had issued a rare and embarrassing rebuke, saying the proposed law could jeopardise Ukraine's bid to join the bloc.

Why would Zelenskyy choose to "squander his political capital" in this way, asked Andreas Rüesch in the Neue Zürcher Zeitung (Zurich). Abroad, Ukraine's wartime president is a hero. But domestically, "he's proven himself for years to be a politician with unforgivable weaknesses", a man who has tried to consolidate power and allowed his allies to carry out "undemocratic manoeuvres". The official reason for the bill was that Russia was influencing anti-corruption investigators. In reality, those investigators had probably "targeted too many of Zelenskyy's political friends".

This whole affair only reaffirms something the EU has known for years, said Anna-Lena Laurén in Dagens Nyheter (Stockholm), but has "chosen to keep quiet about" so as not to undermine the country's fight for survival: "corruption continues to be a major problem in Ukraine". In the military industrial complex in particular, "it is rampant", said Timothy Ash in the Kyiv Post, with insiders skimming hundreds of thousands of dollars from contracts for aeroplane wheels and the like. There's nothing to suggest Zelenskyy himself is "personally corrupt", or that Ukrainians "are more amenable to corruption" than others. It's just an ugly symptom of the "post-Soviet transition".

Zelenskyy may not be corrupt, said Michael Bociurkiw in the same paper, but he and his increasingly powerful chief of staff, Andriy Yermak, are steadily treading down the path to authoritarianism. It's not so much that elections have been suspended – justifiable given the ongoing war. It's that Zelenskyy's most outspoken critics have been silenced or targeted for criminal prosecution, and other government institutions weakened in order to concentrate power in the president's office. These moves are only undermining Ukraine war efforts. This latest scandal will be seen both in Moscow and among the Maga base in Washington as a "welcome PR gift – reinforcing the Kremlin's narrative that Ukraine is irreparably corrupt and unworthy of Western support".

The West isn't blameless either, said Adéla Knapová in Novinky (Prague). For too long, Zelenskyy's allies have refused to ask "uncomfortable questions, let alone issue ultimatums" about his government's behaviour. "It's high time to do what a true friend should do", and tell the Ukrainian leader "we support democracy and civil society, not autocrats". After all, said Svitlana Morenets in The Spectator, isn't that what Ukraine's desperate fight against Putin is all about? "The war for Ukraine's future is being fought not just on the battlefield, but also within its democratic institutions." Last week that battle was almost lost.

When first-term President Donald Trump leaned on Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to provide damaging political material on 2020 electoral rival Joe Biden, his ask was based in part on Ukraine's reputation for a historically questionable commitment to anti-corruption efforts. Fast forward to today, and a very different Ukraine is once again grappling with the specter of crippling national corruption thanks to a controversial law hurriedly signed by Zelenskyy earlier this week. Critics contend it will weaken the country's independent National Anti-Corruption Bureau (NABU) and the Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutor's Office (SAPO) by placing them under the auspices of Ukraine's presidentially appointed prosecutor general.

After days of mass demonstrations in opposition to the new law, Zelenskyy (facing significant domestic policy protests for the first time) appeared to relent. This morning, the Ukrainian president announced on X that he'd approved a new, still ambiguous draft bill which "upholds the independence of NABU and SAPO."

What did the commentators say?

Demonstrations in Kyiv, as well as across Lviv, Dnipro and Odesa, are Ukraine's "biggest anti-government protests" since Russia began its Ukrainian invasion in 2022, said the BBC. While Zelenskyy initially sought to justify the law as a necessary boost for the "efficiency of Ukraine's anti-corruption infrastructure," critics argue that the bill is "at odds" with the country's pro-democracy efforts. For those critics, the stakes in the controversy are clear, said The Nation. Can a country "fighting for survival" also defend the "hard‑won democratic reforms" achieved in its 2014 anti-Russian revolution?

The "unusual speed" with which Ukraine's parliament passed its anti-corruption reforms follows "mounting warnings" from activists who've cautioned against an "escalating crackdown on anti-corruption bodies and NGOs" lately, said The Kyiv Independent. Just one day before Zelenskyy signed the legislation, various Ukrainian security agencies conducted "sweeping searches of NABU and SAPO" in what officials claimed was targeting "suspected Russian infiltration and administrative misconduct." Earlier this month, a top anti-corruption activist was arrested and charged with fraud and evading military service, which defenders said was "political retribution for exposing corrupt officials," Reuters said.

Anti-corruption critics claim Zelenskyy has "overstepped his authority under the martial law imposed since the Russian invasion," with the initial law adjusting the NABU and SAPO's independence marking the "latest in a string of steps he has taken to consolidate his power, said The New York Times.

What next?

By enacting the new law's intended reforms, Zelenskyy risked "endangering" Ukraine's "bid to join the European Union," for which a "crackdown on internal corruption" is a "requirement," said Fox News. Some in Ukraine wonder if the new law and ensuing protests have afforded Russia a "powerful propaganda tool" that could be used not only to further divide Ukraine but also damage its "support from the West at a crucial moment in the war," said NBC News. Western officials are "alarmed" that Ukraine might be "backsliding" on its "endemic graft problem."

By submitting his alternate bill Thursday morning, Zelenskyy hoped to "defuse tensions" with a revised law that "underlines" that the prosecutor general's office "cannot give orders to anti-graft agencies or interfere in their work," The Associated Press said. It's "not immediately clear" when Zelenskyy's new bill will get a parliamentary vote, with protests "likely to continue until the law is passed." Still, representatives from NABU hailed the revised legislation as restoring "all procedural powers and guarantees of independence" to it, said the special prosecutors' office in a post on Telegram.

Nevertheless, should state organs like NABU ultimately lose their independence as the initial law proposed, "there will still be anti-corruption activity," said investigative journalist Yuriy Nikolov to The Kyiv Independent. "What will remain" is "anti-corruption activity against low-level people."

What happened

President Donald Trump announced that the U.S. will send "top-of-the-line weapons" to Ukraine via NATO countries, in a package expected to include Patriot air defense batteries. He also threatened Russia with "severe tariffs" of up to 100% if there isn't a deal to end the war in Ukraine within 50 days, and said the U.S. could impose "secondary sanctions" on Russia's oil customers.

Speaking after a meeting with NATO chief Mark Rutte, Trump said he was "very unhappy" with Russian President Vladimir Putin, whose "very nice phone calls" are often followed by air strikes on Ukraine.

Who said what

The tariff threats are "toothless," said CNN's Nick Paton Walsh, as there is "almost no trade to penalize." But the weapons decision is "still a milestone," said The Wall Street Journal, as it "marks the first time the White House has agreed to furnish weapons for Ukraine" beyond those approved by former President Biden. New Hampshire Senator Jeanne Shaheen, the top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, called the announcement "positive, but overdue."

What next?

Trump said the weapons would be "quickly distributed to the battlefield." To change the trajectory of the war, "substantial deliveries would have to be carried out through the summer," Celeste Wallander, a former senior Pentagon official, told the Journal.

What happened

President Donald Trump Monday said the U.S. would resume sending weapons to Ukraine because "they have to be able to defend themselves" against Russia's attacks. The administration last week paused critical weapons deliveries to Kyiv, citing concerns over dwindling U.S. stockpiles. But in recent days, Trump has expressed increasing frustration with Russian President Vladimir Putin over the lack of progress in ending the more than three-year war. "I'm not happy with President Putin at all," Trump told reporters at the White House Monday.

Who said what

Ukraine is "getting hit very, very hard" by Russia, Trump said. This is undoubtedly "a difficult moment for Ukraine," said The Associated Press, as the embattled nation faces "increasing, and more complex, air barrages from Russia."

Trump's turnaround comes amid "warming ties" with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, said the Financial Times. But relations with Russia appear to be cooling, with Trump telling reporters at last month's NATO summit in The Hague that Putin was proving to be the "more difficult" partner to bring to the negotiating table.

As well as sending previously approved weapons shipments, Trump could crank up the pressure on Putin by asking Congress to approve additional deliveries, said former U.S. National Security Council staffer David Shimer. "Lifting the pause is just a necessary first step," Shimer told The Wall Street Journal. "Now is the time for this administration to go further."

What next?

The White House National Security Council will meet today to discuss resuming weapons deliveries to Ukraine, sources told the Journal. Pentagon spokesperson Sean Parnell said Monday that the U.S. would continue to follow an "America First" strategy when considering military shipments.

What happened

Kyiv Wednesday said it was seeking clarification about the Trump administration's surprise decision to halt shipments of air-defense missiles and other weapons approved for delivery to Ukraine. The Defense Department acknowledged the canceled arms deliveries on Tuesday and said Wednesday the suspension was part of a global review of where the Pentagon is sending its limited supplies of munitions.

A spokesperson "declined to say whether the military had paused the delivery of weapons to other countries," The New York Times said.

Who said what

The move to halt Ukraine weapons shipments was "driven by Pentagon policy chief Elbridge Colby" without any evident consultation with Congress or other parts of the administration, Politico said, and it "blindsided even people who are usually closely briefed on such matters." The withheld munitions include Patriot air defense missiles, "precision-guided GMLRS, Hellfire missiles and Howitzer rounds," The Associated Press said, "some of the most formidable weapons" in Ukraine's arsenal.

The halt comes at a "particularly precarious time for Ukraine," with Russia "pounding the country every few days" with hundreds of drones followed by "powerful ballistic missiles that only Patriot missiles can intercept," the Times said. President Donald Trump "has not approved new military aid packages for Ukraine," and to "compensate," Ukraine has "recently launched joint arms production programs with European allies."

It's "no surprise" that this "conscious decision to deny Kyiv weapons it was counting on before Russia's summer assaults" came from Colby, a Ukraine funding skeptic whose "chief patron" is Vice President J.D. Vance and top "outside cheerleader is Tucker Carlson," The Wall Street Journal said in an editorial. Trump "says he wants to end the war to save lives, but denying arms to Ukraine will mean more death and a longer war."

What next?

Cheering the halt, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said "the less weapons are supplied to Ukraine, the closer the end" of the war. Ukraine's Foreign Ministry said "any delay or hesitation in supporting Ukraine's defense capabilities will only encourage the aggressor to continue war and terror, not seek peace."

What happened

President Donald Trump said he and Russian President Vladimir Putin had a "good" 75-minute phone conversation Wednesday, "but not a conversation that will lead to immediate peace." Putin said, "very strongly, that he will have to respond" to Ukraine's weekend drone strikes on Moscow's most prized warplanes deep inside Russia, Trump recounted on social media.

Who said what

Trump's recap of the call did not say "how he reacted to Putin's promise" of retaliation, The Associated Press said, and it "showed none of the frustration" Trump has expressed in recent weeks over Putin's "prolonging of the war." Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov did not mention Putin's retribution vow in Moscow's readout, but said the leaders discussed the drone strike "at some length." In Russia, CNN said, pro-Kremlin pundits and bloggers are "seething with calls for retribution, even nuclear retaliation."

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Wednesday night that none of the phone calls with Putin "have brought a reliable peace," and "with every new strike, with every delay of diplomacy, Russia is giving the finger to the entire world." The powerful "share responsibility" with Putin if they don't stop him, he wrote on social media, "and if they want to stop him but cannot, then Putin will no longer see them as powerful."

What next?

U.S. officials assess that Ukraine's explosive drones hit 20 Russian strategic bombers and spy plans and destroyed 10, Reuters said, about "half the number" Zelenskyy claims but still a "highly significant" strike that could "drive Moscow to a far more severe negotiating position in the U.S.-brokered talks."

It took 18 months of planning and more than 100 carefully hidden attack drones smuggled to various clandestine staging sites deep inside Russian territory, waiting to be activated. And when the dust settled on June 1, Ukraine's audacious operation "Spider's Web" left dozens of Russian bombers smoldering on their airstrips in an unprecedented surprise attack.

While drones have increasingly played a role in 21st century warfare, "Spider's Web" is quickly being weighed by military analysts as a new and potentially precedent-setting expansion of unmanned combat tactics and capabilities — one which has not only altered the course of the ongoing Russo-Ukrainian conflict, but perhaps the future of war itself.

What did the commentators say?

The "strategic and symbolic" success of Ukraine's operation shows how the country has used drones in particular to "adapt and evolve" in its effort against Russia's "much larger army with more resources," said The New York Times. The scale and impact of the attack means similar long-range drone strikes are "now a commodity available to almost every nation state, and nonstate actor," so long as they have a "few million dollars and the desire to reach out and strike their adversary," said Australian Gen. Mick Ryan (Ret.), a senior fellow for military studies at the Lowy Institute, to the Times. The attack was "likely highly cost-effective," the Kyiv Independent said. The first-person-view drones believed to have been used in the operation can cost a few hundred dollars apiece, while the price tag for Russia's destroyed bombers likely "runs into the billions."

The attack may have been a brazen success, but the "means and technology to conduct an operation like this aren't that new," said Center for New American Security Senior Fellow Samuel Bendett to the Kyiv Independent. The potential for "wide-scale, low-end, localized drone attacks against prized aircraft sitting at airfields" has been a "brewing threat," said defense industry–focused publication The War Zone. Drone technology has "proliferated dramatically," while the "threshold requirements" for carrying out an operation like this have "dropped considerably." Ukraine's drone assault was a "really good example of just how quickly technology is changing the battlefield," said Army Chief of Staff Gen. Randy George at an AI conference yesterday, per DefenseScoop.

What next?

Ukraine's drone assault means Russia must now "devote more resources to protecting bombers and other valuable military assets" after having spent years leaving its assets "parked outside and easily visible, both for operational reasons and as part of nuclear-disarmament agreements with Washington around the end of the Cold War," said The Wall Street Journal.

Ukraine's advances in drone warfare often "outpace traditional U.S. defense contractors," said the Kyiv Post, with many tech firms "increasingly turning to Ukrainian drone makers for their frontline expertise." And it's not just corporate interests paying attention, either. This summer, Ukraine will host a group of soldiers from Denmark, training them in the art of widespread drone warfare, Defense News said. Meanwhile, a "new crop of testing facilities designed to test the small aircraft in war-like conditions" will begin operating across various European nations inspired to keep pace with Ukraine's drone innovations.

What happened

Ukraine struck 41 Russian long-range bombers and other military aircraft Sunday in a covert drone attack on air bases as far away as Siberia and the Finnish border, officials in Kyiv said. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Ukraine's Security Service (SBU) had worked on the operation for 18 months, and the 117 drones they smuggled close to four air bases had disabled 34% of Russia's strategic bombers. Earlier Sunday, Russia killed at least 12 Ukrainian soldiers and wounded dozens more at a training base, Kyiv said, and hours before that Moscow launched 472 drones and seven missiles at Ukraine, hitting 18 targets.

Who said what

The "audacious" drone operation was a "significant victory for Ukraine's deep-strike program," The Wall Street Journal said, and the "biggest blow of the war against Moscow's long-range bomber fleet," which is also "vital to Russia's nuclear forces." Russia has been using Tu-95 and Tu-22 bombers to hit Ukraine with hard-to-intercept ballistic missiles, and "killing the archers instead of intercepting the arrows" is "a more effective way to degrade Russian capabilities," said George Barros, an analyst at the Institute for the Study of War.

SBU officials told Western media organizations they had hidden small explosive quadcopter drones inside the roofs of mobile wooden houses that were then driven near the Belaya, Ivanovo, Dyagilevo and Olenya air bases and released. They said the attack, codenamed Operation Spider's Web, inflicted $7 billion worth of irreparable damage to Russia's aging bomber fleet. Russia's Defense Ministry said the "terrorist attack" caused "several units of aircraft" to catch fire at the Belaya and Olenya airfields but the "fires have been extinguished" and there were "no casualties." Russia's "influential" pro-war military bloggers described the assault as the "Russian Pearl Harbor," The Washington Post said.

Zelenskyy called the results "absolutely brilliant" and "achieved solely by Ukraine." The "people involved in preparing the operation were withdrawn from Russian territory in time," he added. "Ukraine is defending itself, and rightly so — we are doing everything to make Russia feel the need to end this war."

What next?

Zelenskyy said he was sending Defense Minister Rustem Umerov to scheduled ceasefire talks with Russia in Istanbul Monday, though "the key issues can only be resolved by the leaders."

President Donald Trump once promised to end the Russo-Ukrainian war within 24 hours of taking office. Instead, the war drags on. And now the president is sending mixed signals, suggesting he will abandon ceasefire negotiations even as he ratchets up rhetoric against Russia's Vladimir Putin.

Trump said Putin is acting "absolutely crazy" after Russia launched a new round of deadly drone and missile attacks against Ukraine over the weekend, said the BBC. The attacks are "needlessly killing a lot of people," Trump said on Truth Social. But the violence came amid increasing signs that Trump is ready to "walk away" from peace efforts, said The New York Times. After a phone call with Putin last week, Trump said on social media that any peace agreement "will be negotiated between the two parties" instead of through an American-led process. Trump has "grown weary and frustrated with both sides of the conflict," said Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt. The president's new position is that the war is "not my problem," said the Times.

What did the commentators say?

Ukraine and its European allies have long feared that Trump would "throw up his hands" and declare that "neither side wants peace," Stephen Collinson said at CNN. That would allow Russia to "press on with its war of attrition and attacks on civilians." The weekend attacks raise a new possibility: Trump's criticism of Putin could mark a departure from his willingness to let Ukraine go forward without the U.S. at its side. Trump has "never been keen to criticize Putin" after all. But it is "risky to take Trump's weekend rhetoric at face value." For now there is no way to "be sure which way he'll jump."

It was "always a possibility" that Trump would back out of the peace process, said Stefan Wolff at The Conversation. The possibility became more likely after initial ceasefire negotiations with Russia and Ukraine "predictably ended without a ceasefire agreement." Trump now appears to be more interested in a "broader reset of relations between the U.S. and Russia" than an end to the war. ("Russia wants to do large-scale trade with the United States" when the conflict ends, Trump said on Truth Social.) "Abandoning his mediation" between Moscow and Kyiv might aid that reset and allow closer trade relations between Trump and Putin's countries, but the result will be a "pyrrhic victory."

What next?

"Europe is on its own," said The Atlantic. That outcome was probably "inevitable," given Trump's skepticism of Europe and belief that American policy "should prioritize business and trade." But Trump's willingness to back out is "enabling Russia's advances." And it means Europe will increasingly be tasked with "supplying Ukraine with weapons and guaranteeing its future security."

Trump may have criticized Putin after the weekend attacks on Ukraine, but he "declined to answer questions about whether the attacks will lead to a change in policy," said the Times. After the weekend, though, Russia announced a prisoner exchange had been negotiated with Ukraine, said NBC News. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov gave credit to the American president. Trump is a "man who wants results," Lavrov said.

What happened

German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said Monday that his government, France, Britain and the U.S. had lifted "any range restrictions for weapons that have been delivered to Ukraine," allowing Kyiv to "defend itself by, for example, attacking military positions in Russia." His comments followed Russia's biggest drone and missile attacks of the war, which prompted President Donald Trump to claim that Russian President Vladimir Putin "has gone absolutely CRAZY!" Russia suggested Trump's criticism stemmed from "emotional overload."

Who said what

"I don’t know what the hell happened to Putin," Trump told reporters Sunday in New Jersey. "I've known him a long time, always gotten along with him, but he's sending rockets into cities and killing people and I don’t like it at all." Putin is "needlessly killing a lot of people" for "no reason whatsoever," he said on social media a few hours later.

When asked by reporters, Trump said he was "absolutely" considering new sanctions on Russia. But he has made empty threats about sanctions before and "expressed shock that the Russian president was unleashing attacks on Ukrainian civilians," while refusing to give Kyiv new weapons or missile defenses, said The New York Times. "The result is a strategic void" in which Trump "complains about Russia's continued killing" but won't make Putin "pay even a modest price."

Trump's decisions on Ukraine are "colored" by his "dislike" for President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and his belief that Putin "would end the war as a personal favor" to him, The Wall Street Journal said. After Putin "refused" to meet with Zelenskyy in Turkey for peace talks, Trump "claimed that the only way to achieve progress in the war would be by him speaking directly" with Putin, The Washington Post said. "The two men spoke for several hours by phone last week, and Russia has since ramped up its devastating attacks across Ukraine."

What next?

Merz, speaking at a forum organized by public broadcaster WDR, was "tightlipped" on whether his new government would supply Kyiv with Tarsus missiles, which have a range of 310 miles, The Associated Press said. He cited a need for "strategic ambiguity."

What happened

President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin spoke for two hours Monday in a phone call Trump characterized as "excellent" and Putin described as "very informative and very frank." Trump said "some progress has been made" toward ending Russia's Ukraine war, but he backed off an earlier demand that Putin agree to an immediate ceasefire, a condition accepted by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

Who said what

"Russia and Ukraine will immediately start negotiations toward a ceasefire and, more importantly, an END to the war," Trump said on social media after the call. "The conditions for that will be negotiated between the two parties, as it can only be." Putin, who rejected an invitation to meet with Zelenskyy in Turkey last week, said Russia was "ready to work" with Kyiv "on a memorandum on a possible future peace agreement."

Trump is "banking on the idea that his force of personality and personal history with Putin will be enough to break any impasse over a pause in the fighting," The Associated Press said. But the "lack of any meaningful breakthrough" in Monday's call, The New York Times said, shows that Trump's "belief in his personal charisma and negotiating acumen has so far run up against deep divisions and complex political motivations guiding Russia and Ukraine."

What next?

There are "big egos involved," Trump told reporters Monday. "I think something's going to happen and, if it doesn't I'd just back away and they have to keep going."