European heads of government and leaders of Canada and Turkey will attend talks aimed at presenting a united front on Ukraine crisis. What we know on day 1,103
Volodymyr Zelenskyy is willing to “restore dialogue” with the US, French president Emmanuel Macron has said after speaking with the Ukrainian leader following the disastrous White House exchange with US president Donald Trump on Friday. Macron said the dialogue would include a deal that would give US access to revenues from Ukraine’s natural resources. Macron also spoke to Trump but did not reveal any details about the call. The White House had no immediate comment.
Macron’s comments come as Zelenskyy arrived in London ahead of a summit of European leaders on Sunday that the Ukrainian president will attend to discuss a peace plan for the Russia-Ukraine war. UK prime minister Keir Starmer will host European heads of government and the leaders of Canada and Turkey at the special defence summit aimed at presenting a united front on Ukraine.
Prior to the summit, Starmer told Zelenskyy he had “full backing across the United Kingdom” and that “we stand with you and Ukraine for as long as it may take”. Zelenskyy said Kyiv would use a new £2.26bn ($2.84bn) loan from the UK to manufacture weapons in Ukraine.
Zelenskyy is also due to meet King Charles on Sunday. The official audience is to be held at the British monarch’s Sandringham estate in eastern England. Zelenskyy told Starmer he was “very happy” the king had agreed to the meeting.
Turkey’s foreign minister will reiterate at Sunday’s meeting of European leaders an offer from Ankara to host peace talks between Ukraine and Russia, a Turkish diplomatic source said.
Russian strikes around Ukraine killed one person and wounded 19, Ukrainian officials said on Saturday. In the southern Odesa region, one died and three were injured, Ukrainian prosecutors said. The regional governor said a Russian missile struck port facilities in the city of Odesa, injuring two port workers and damaging infrastructure and a vessel. Oleh Kiper said on Telegram that the strike damaged a Panamanian-flagged vessel belonging to a European company.
Moscow claims to have seized two more villages in eastern Ukraine. Russian forces captured Sudne and Burlatske in the south of the eastern Donetsk region, the defence ministry said on Saturday. The villages are near the town of Velyka Novosilka, which was seized by the Russian army at the end of January.
A new monitoring mission from the UN nuclear watchdog arrived at the Russian-held Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant in Ukraine on Saturday for the first time through Russian territory, the Moscow-installed head of the plant said. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) rotation came after weeks of delay caused by military activity around the site with each side blaming the other for violating rules to ensure the team’s safe passage to the plant. Yuri Chernichuk, the head of the plant in south-eastern Ukraine, said on Telegram the arrival of three inspectors was ensured by Russia’s defence ministry and national guard and followed “intense” consultations between the heads of Russia’s state nuclear power company Rosatom and the IAEA. The report could not be independently verified.
Russia said on Saturday it had shot down three Ukrainian drones targeting a major gas pipeline carrying Russian supplies to Europe via Turkey, in the second such incident this year. The attack was aimed at the Russkaya gas compressor station in the southern Krasnodar region, an element of the TurkStream pipeline network, according to Moscow. Kyiv has not commented on the claim. Russia alleged Ukraine attempted to hit the same compressor station on 11 January.
Hundreds of people marched through central Berlin on Saturday alongside Yulia Navalnaya, the widow of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, to demand an end to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Navalnaya was at the head of the march alongside Russian opposition figures Ilya Yashin and Vladimir Kara-Murza. Alongside slogans denouncing Russian president Vladimir Putin and Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine, some protesters also carried signs criticising Donald Trump.
