Dozens injured and detained as anti-government protests in Serbia gather pace
Wednesday's unrest started in the northern city of Novi Sad when supporters of the ruling Serbian Progressive Party threw flares at anti-government protesters who had been marching past the party offices, according to video from the scene.
Clashes there continued throughout the evening with rival groups hurling various objects at each other amid clouds of smoke and chaos.
An army security officer at the SNS party offices at one point fired his gun in the air, saying later he felt his life had been in danger.
The incidents marked an escalation in the persistent protests led by Serbia's university students that have rattled Mr Vucic's increasingly autocratic rule in Serbia.
Similar clashes were also reported on Tuesday evening.
The Serbian president has faced accusations of stifling democratic freedoms and of allowing organised crime and corruption to flourish, which he has denied.
Interior minister Dacic accused the protesters of attacking the governing party loyalists.
He said 'those who broke the law will be identified and sanctioned'.
Skirmishes also erupted in the capital Belgrade where riot police used tear gas to disperse groups of protesters.
Riot police formed a cordon around a makeshift camp of Mr Vucic's loyalists outside the presidency building downtown.
University students posted on X to accuse the authorities of trying to 'provoke a civil war with the clashes' at demonstrations that passed without incident even while drawing hundreds of thousands of people.
'Police were guarding the regime loyalists who were throwing rocks and firing flares at the protesters,' the students added.
Demonstrations started in November after a renovated train station canopy crashed in Novi Sad, killing 16 people and triggering accusations of corruption in state-run infrastructure projects.
More protests are planned on Thursday evening.
The protesters are demanding that Mr Vucic call an early parliamentary election, which he has refused to do.
Serbia is formally seeking European Union membership, but Mr Vucic has maintained strong ties with Russia and China.
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The Guardian
6 hours ago
- The Guardian
‘We would love to enter Eurovision!' The boy who saw some unclaimed land – and founded his own country
Most presidential residences feature a grand entrance, security guards, perhaps a few pillars. They also tend to be inside the country of which the occupant is president. Yet when I arrive at the home of Daniel Jackson, president of the Free Republic of Verdis, it is neither magnificent, nor on the Serbian-Croatian border, where his country is situated, but on a small street round the back of a bingo hall in Dover, Kent. Jackson, 20, was born in Australia to British parents, and lived in Melbourne until he was 17. He was only 14 when he and a group of friends decided they 'wanted to do something that was unique'. While most others their age were scrolling TikTok, Jackson and his friends – some from south-east Europe who he had met online, some from Waverley Christian College, the Melbourne private school he attended – scoured maps, and discovered an unclaimed strip of forest that falls outside the borders of Croatia and Serbia. They thought it would be fun to see if they could make it into a country, and named it Verdis. The 'micronation' (a largely unrecognised small country, as opposed to officially recognised 'microstates' such as Andorra and Monaco) is just 1.6 hectares larger than Vatican City and has never been inhabited. It has not been part of a nation since the dissolution of Yugoslavia. 'Obviously that was more than 30 years ago,' says Jackson. 'So we believe we're rightful to it under international law.' Though there is no single, universal way to acquire sovereignty over a territory, Jackson and his fellow Verdis enthusiasts have formed a government, established laws, mapped out the area, planted a flag (pale blue and white stripes; very similar to Argentina's) and attracted 15,000 applications for citizenship, 400 of which have been accepted. Legal experts have told Jackson that 'under international law, the oldest active claimant to the land is the rightful claimant', he says. 'Which is us, because Croatia and Serbia have never claimed this land.' Verdis is the result of a border dispute in the region. Serbia considers its border to be the centre line of the Danube (this has mostly been the accepted border since the Croatian war of independence ended in 1995). But Croatia wants the border to be 'cadastral' – based on old border maps. The discrepancy has resulted in a few unclaimed pockets of land, such as Verdis (which sits on the Croatian side of the Danube, but outside Croatia's self-defined border). Jackson and his government have always had a 'positive experience' in Serbia, but Croatian authorities have refused to recognise Verdis, presumably seeing it as an unhelpful presence in this border dispute. In October 2023, when Jackson and a group of citizens attempted to settle permanently in Verdis, they were forcibly removed by the Croatian police. Jackson and his vice-president, Hector Bowles, who lives between Dover and Bulgaria and was introduced to Jackson via a mutual friend, were issued lifetime bans from Croatia. This is a significant setback, given that it is difficult to access Verdis without entering Croatia. And so Jackson is now, as he puts it, 'in exile', living with a family friend in Dover, where he works from home as a freelance game developer for the online platform Roblox. Still, when I show up at his door, the 20-year-old is in full president mode, dressed in a suit and tie, a tiny metal Verdisian flag pinned to his lapel, and another, much larger fabric flag stretched across a display stand that has been placed in the corner of the otherwise very ordinary living room. I can't help but feel slightly bemused that Jackson has gone to this effort to prepare for my visit – and even more so when he insists on checking the bathroom has been left in a good condition before allowing me to use it. It's all very endearing, but it feels more like a roleplay of a meeting with a politician. Jackson admits that, at first, Verdis wasn't something that he took too seriously. 'It was a bit of an experiment,' he says, inspired by Liberland, a larger pocket of previously unclaimed land 20km north of Verdis. That micronation is similarly unclaimed by Croatia and Serbia and was declared an independent country by Czech rightwing politician Vít Jedlička in 2015, who intended the nation to be a tax haven. 'We liked the idea of Liberland, but we didn't agree entirely with its ideology,' Jackson says – so they decided to see if they could create their own version. The name Verdis was chosen for its similarity to the Latin word for green – viridis – and the initial concept for the new country was that it would focus on environmental concerns. For several years, Verdis remained little more than an idea; until 2023, when interest in the micronation began to grow. Jackson, then 18, made several trips to the territory with some of its other supporters. 'We were bringing in tree surgeons. We were doing a lot of cadastral [surveying] work. We camped there for quite a long time if you put all the trips together,' he says. 'I thought: let's make it a reality.' While I can just about get my head around the idea of a hare-brained teenage scheme that got out of hand, I am finding it difficult to understand why Jackson is still pouring so many resources into a project that is a constant struggle – spending hours learning Serbian and Croatian (Verdis's two other official languages, as well as English), constantly raising awareness, and creating passports that you can't even use to travel. (You can, at least, use them as ID in bars, which Jackson says he has done 'many times'.) There is also the matter of funding – though Verdis's government positions are voluntary, the nation pays ministers' travel costs to Verdis and to any political forums for which they are able to secure invitations, as well as paying to host its website (using a third-party hosting company was deemed too insecure). Jackson and his government have come up with a number of ways to raise money, from selling Verdis merchandise to asking for donations and setting up a citizenship-by-investment scheme. This month the country received a donation of more than $37,000 USD, raised by cryptocurrency enthusiasts through an unaffiliated coin known as $Verdis. Clearly there are people who can grasp Jackson's motivation better than I can. It's possible that part of the reason for this is my gender – just as it tends to be the male halves of Grand Designs couples who have a stronger desire to build themselves a palace, whatever the cost, it seems that men are more inclined to start a new country: 70% of Verdis's citizens, and all seven of its government ministers, are men. This is not because of any kind of meninist agenda, Jackson assures me, and it is something he would like to address, but 'it's a lot harder to find women who are interested in getting involved'. While he awaits the day he can attempt to turn these plans for a settlement into reality, Jackson has been spreading the word about Verdis in his local area: he loves a kebab, and his loyal patronage has got the staff at Dover Kebab posting stories about Verdis on Instagram. Jackson moved to Dover after dropping out of school at 17. Australia's 'quite severe' lockdown during the Covid-19 pandemic 'killed a lot of my motivation to continue to attend school', he says. He wanted a 'fresh start', and had 'always preferred being in the UK' to Australia, having visited many times throughout his childhood to see family. He initially secured a job with ferry company DFDS, on the Dover to Dunkirk route. Though freelance work suits him much better these days, given his frequent trips to south-east Europe, he still loves the ferries, and plans to treat himself to a short trip to Calais soon. He's had a 'full-on July' travelling to Serbia to raise awareness about Verdis, and briefly to Verdis itself, where he was once again chased off the land by Croatian police. Jackson says he has been assured that the territory is rightfully his under international law, but 'it's hard for us to take legal action against Croatia when they're not allowing us to access their legal system', he says. He tells me about a recent instance when citizens of Liberland tried to take a Croatian police officer to court after he injured one of them, and 'the judge threw the case out because it didn't happen in Croatian territory'. Any attempts by Verdisians to make similar cases would probably be discarded in the same way, he thinks. 'And in order to take a case to the European court of human rights, 'we have to exhaust all resources in Croatia, which is hard for us to do'. The Croatian authorities were approached but have made no comment on Jackson's case. Resuming a settlement on the land is Jackson's primary goal – a presence there will release funding that has been agreed with an NGO (he can't tell me which one, as he has been made to sign an NDA), and will vastly improve Verdis's chances of becoming an officially recognised state. But he says Croatia has 'now installed cameras all along Verdis's coastline, so if you even hover your boat for 10 minutes in the territorial waters, a Croatian police boat will be on its way very quickly'. And Jackson and his affiliates have to be careful – after the 2023 deportation, some of Verdis's boats went missing – he suspects they were taken by the Croatian authorities. He is remarkably hopeful, however. 'Croatia still insists Verdis is not part of Croatia,' he says. 'So we believe it's a matter of when, not if, we're back on the land.' He hopes that with enough pressure from publicity, or perhaps a change of Croatian government, the country will come to recognise Verdis – and even become open to working together. 'Even though we're not happy with what Croatia's done, especially their violation of international law and the way they've treated our citizens, we still want good relations with them in the future,' Jackson says. I'm not sure if his relentless optimism is simply due to his age or rooted more deeply in his character, but Jackson seems convinced that he will one day live in Verdis, and has plenty of dreams for what the country might eventually look like. Though the original environmental focus has taken a back seat ('We still want to be environmentally conscious … but as Verdis's population builds up we will have to relocate a lot of wildlife'), he envisions the country as a neutral state; 'a middleground between other countries' and 'a good hub for NGOs'. Humanitarianism is a priority for Verdis's government. Most of its cabinet members have previously undertaken aid work – Bowles, for example, set up the Dover-based charity DIY Ukraine in 2022, delivering supplies to Ukrainians, and Verdis previously ran its own Ukrainian aid programme via this charity. Though Jackson says Verdis 'would want to be part of the eurozone', EU membership is not a goal: 'I am a very pro-EU person, but the EU is not designed for small countries.' A Eurovision song contest entry, on the other hand, very much is. 'We would love to, honestly,' Jackson says, adding that Verdis has 'quite a good few connections with Eurovision contestants anyway' – namely Luke Black, Serbia's 2023 entry, who Jackson has met and says is 'quite a big supporter' of Verdis. When approached by the Guardian, the singer said he had found Jackson's vision for Verdis 'interesting, especially given he's in his early 20s and leading such an initiative'. Though he is 'not affiliated with Verdis in any way', the singer added: 'I wish them well in their efforts.' Astonishingly, given all the time he has dedicated to Verdis's creation and his hopes for its future, Jackson plans to step down from the presidency the moment the country becomes an established state. 'I just want to be a normal citizen by then,' he says. His own politics are 'centrist', but he would accept the result of an election. 'Even if I don't agree with the next president's views, that's up to the Verdisians to decide, which I would always respect.' Some of his cabinet members may be interested in running for president, he thinks; but others, like him, have already become 'exhausted' by the workload involved. 'It would be nice to have a break,' he says. 'But we won't give up.' I can't help but wonder again why he is bothering to go through all of this when it's such an uphill battle, and the reward – a sliver of land that is currently uninhabitable – seems so small. 'You have to be nuts to start something like this, of course,' he concedes. 'But the world is boring without trying something crazy.'
Reuters
9 hours ago
- Reuters
War or peace? For oil markets, the Ukraine outcome is insignificant
LONDON, Aug 19 (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump's high-stakes diplomacy to resolve the war in Ukraine is unlikely to jolt oil and gas markets, no matter the outcome. Russia has faced multiple rounds of western sanctions and restrictions since its invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, which have dealt severe blows to the country's giant oil and gas industry, sapping Moscow of vital revenue and reshaping global energy markets. Russian gas now accounts for just 18% of European imports, down from 45% in 2021, while the bloc's oil imports from Russia have fallen to 3% from around 30% over that time. The European Union plans to fully phase out Russian energy by 2027. Meanwhile, India has increased its share of Russian crude to 38% of total imports from 16% in 2021, according to Kpler. China and Turkey have also notably ramped up their Russian oil purchases. The war in Ukraine has left over a million dead or wounded, so its conclusion would be welcomed by many. Energy markets, however, are not apt to register much of a reaction unless there is a full ceasefire along with the lifting of all U.S. and European sanctions. And that is long shot. Given the more probable set of scenarios, oil and gas markets are unlikely to be rattled by the fallout from either last Friday's disappointing summit between Trump and Russian President Valdimir Putin or the U.S. president's meetingwith his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelenskiy and European leaders on Monday. Full peace in Ukraine remains highly improbable. Trump's apparent support for a comprehensive settlement, rather than a ceasefire, has widened the gap between America, Ukraine and Europe. At the same time, his suggestion of U.S. post-settlement security guarantees for Ukraine is likely to face resistance from Moscow. In other words, don't bet on a full normalization of relations between Russia and the West any time soon. Trump might pressure Zelenskiy into accepting a temporary or partial halt in fighting. But even then, Europe is unlikely to resume Russian energy imports while Putin remains in power. Before 2022, Europe accounted for nearly half of Russia's 4.7 million barrels per day of oil exports and 75% of its gas exports, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. The Trump administration could attempt to ease some sanctions unilaterally, but this could face opposition in Congress, including from Republicans, unless a broad peace deal is reached. Perhaps the more likely scenario – Trump failing to broker a deal – also shouldn't have a major impact on energy markets. The U.S. could tighten sanctions, particularly by targeting buyers of Russian energy, as Trump has already threatened. But the U.S. president said on Friday that he would delay so-called "secondary sanctions" on China due to what he described as 'successful' talks with Putin. Of course, India already faces secondary tariffs over its Russian oil purchases. Earlier this month, Trump announced a 25% tariff on Indian goods, citing the country's continued oil imports from Russia. The new tariff, effective August 27, will bring total tariffs on Indian imports to 50%. But even though Indian buyers already appear to be reducing their Russian oil purchases, the impact on global supplies has been minimal as China has increased its intake of Russian crude. Ultimately, China matters far more in this story, and it's unlikely to significantly curb its Russian oil imports, not least because it considers its relationship with Moscow to be strategic. Chinese and Russian oil producers, refiners and traders have already built a sprawling network of tankers and insurers to circumvent Western sanctions on Venezuela, Iran, and Russia. Additionally, U.S. tariffs on Chinese goods already average 55%, according to the Peterson Institute for International Economics. Additional tariffs could raise costs for U.S. consumers, and Beijing could retaliate, potentially by withholding rare earths or other critical minerals, all outcomes Trump would want to avoid – and Beijing knows this. In short, Trump appears to have little stomach for the potential consequences, and even if he were to tighten sanctions, this likely wouldn't materially affect China's ability to import oil. Crucially, oil and gas markets appear to be entering a period of oversupply, meaning any possible disruption in Russian volumes can easily be offset. The IEA expects oil supply to exceed demand by 1.76 million barrels per day in 2025 and by 3 million bpd in 2026, driven by rising output from OPEC+ and the Americas. Global liquefied natural gas (LNG) markets are also expanding rapidly, with new supply coming online in the coming years across the U.S., Qatar, Canada, and elsewhere. LNG capacity is projected to grow from 500 million tons per year in 2024 to 800 mtpa by 2030, according to the International Energy Agency. While Trump's foreign policy remains unpredictable, a few things seem clear. He can't, as he once claimed, end the Ukraine war in one day, and what he can do is unlikely to have much of an impact on oil and gas markets. Enjoying this column? Check out Reuters Open Interest (ROI),, opens new tab your essential new source for global financial commentary. ROI delivers thought-provoking, data-driven analysis. Markets are moving faster than ever. ROI, opens new tab can help you keep up. Follow ROI on LinkedIn, opens new tab and X., opens new tab
Times
a day ago
- Times
Zelensky-Trump meeting: ‘I know exactly what I'm doing,' says US president
European Union leaders will meet via video conference on Tuesday for an emergency debrief on Monday's talks with Trump in Washington. Antonio Costa, the president of the European Council, has convened the meeting so President Macron of France, Friedrich Merz of Germany and other senior EU figures can brief other leaders on the outcome. Sir Keir Starmer has gone straight to the Ukrainian embassy in Washington DC after landing in the US. The prime minister will join the head of Nato, Mark Rutte, and the president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, who were earlier seen arriving at the embassy. President Trump's proposal of a security guarantee for Ukraine could provide a breakthrough in peace negotiations, but may equally be a false dawn, warn experts. President Zelensky and European leaders will press Trump on the specifics of his plan to deter future Russian aggression, during their hastily arranged meeting in Washington on Monday. Zelensky has said that for the guarantee to work, it must deliver 'protection on land, in the air and at sea, and must be developed with Europe's participation'. • Read in full: What could Trump's 'Nato-style' security guarantee mean for Ukraine? In another Truth Social post, President Trump once again claimed the Russia-Ukraine war would not have happened if he had been in power. 'I'm only here to stop it, not to prosecute it any further,' he wrote. 'It would have NEVER happened if I was President. I know exactly what I'm doing, and I don't need the advice of people who have been working on all of these conflicts for years, and were never able to do a thing to stop them.' In a posting that potentially offered hints as to the president's mood before today's all-important meeting, he fired a shot at his 'critics', saying: 'They are 'STUPID' people, with no common sense, intelligence, or understanding, and they only make the current R/U disaster more difficult to FIX.' President Putin had conversations with three of his allies on Monday in which he discussed the recent meeting in Alaska with Donald Trump. The Russian leader spoke over the phone to Narendra Modi, the prime minister of India; Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, the president of Brazil; and Emomali Rahmon, the president of Tajikistan. Both Modi and da Silva reiterated their calls for a peaceful end to the war in Ukraine, the Indian and Brazilian presidential offices said. The Kremlin said that Rahmon welcomed the peace talks. All three countries are close allies to Russia, with India and Brazil part of the Brics group, and Tajikistan a member of the Russian-led Collective Security Treaty Organisation, a military alliance of former Soviet nations. Sir Keir Starmer has landed in the US ahead of a meeting between President Zelensky, President Trump and other European leaders at the White House. The prime minister arrived at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland, the military airbase near the US capital that is frequently used by visiting dignitaries and by the president when he flies on Air Force One. President Zelensky said he will discuss securing western security guarantees for Ukraine during today's meeting with President Trump and top European leaders. 'We will have time to speak about the architecture of security guarantees. This is, really, the most important,' Zelensky during talks today with Trump's special envoy on Ukraine, Keith Kellogg. Ukraine's defence minister has said that Russia would remain an 'existential threat to the country for a long time, perhaps for ever' even if a peace agreement was reached. Denys Shmyhal, who was appointed to the role last month having served as prime minister for five years, said that the best guarantee of Ukrainian security would be a well-equipped and well-trained army. He said that the country would need to maintain a standing army of roughly the size it is now — about 1 million active personnel — adding that discussions were being had with Western allies as to how many soldiers would be needed to defend the border with Russia. '[The army] will not decrease in size sharply after the end of this war, it will be a very planned and calculated process and it will not be quick,' he said. Sir Keir Starmer has said 'we've got to get this right' in a video posted en route to Washington DC. In a social media clip filmed on the plane, the prime minister said: 'This war in Ukraine has been going on for a really long time now, three-plus years. It's hugely impacted the Ukrainians who've suffered hugely but it's also affected Europe — it's impacted every single family and community in the United Kingdom. 'And so everybody wants it to end, not least the Ukrainians, but we've got to get it right. We've got to make sure there is peace, that it is lasting peace, that it is fair and that it is just. And that's why I'm travelling to Washington with other European leaders to discuss this face-to-face with President Trump and President Zelensky, because it's in everyone's interests, it's in the UK's interests, that we get this right.' Please enable cookies and other technologies to view this content. You can update your cookies preferences any time using privacy manager. Here is a rundown of the key timings for today's summit: 12:00pm (5pm BST) European leaders to arrive at the White House 1pm (6pm BST) President Zelensky arrives at the White House 1.15pm (6:15pm BST) President Trump and Zelensky to meet in the Oval Office 2.15pm (7:15 pm BST) Trump greets the European leaders in State Dining Room 2.30pm (7:30pm BST) Group photo with European leaders 3pm (8pm BST) Trump has meeting with European leaders President Trump has told President Zelensky that Ukraine must 'swap' land to agree a deal with Russia. It is not yet clear what exactly the US president means and Zelensky has appeared reluctant to accept any deal requiring Ukraine to surrender territory, saying: 'Ukrainians will not gift their land to the occupier.' So what sort of a deal does Trump have in mind? In the article below we explore four scenarios of what could happen. • Ukraine's border in maps: the options explained A senior Russian commander has been seriously wounded on the front line of the war with Ukraine, a senior official said on Monday. General Esedulla Abachev, deputy commander of Russia's northern group of forces, and who comes from the country's Dagestan region, was in a serious but stable condition in 'one of the best military medical centres in the country', Sergei Melikov, a military leader, said on Telegram. Ukrainian military intelligence said on Sunday that Abachev had an arm and a leg amputated after being wounded in a Ukrainian strike on a Russian military column on a highway in the Kursk region of western Russia, and that he was being treated in Moscow. Those details could not yet be independently confirmed. At least a dozen Russian generals have been killed since Moscow's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. The White House has asked Ukrainian officials if President Zelensky will wear a suit to his meeting with President Trump later today, according to the Axios news site. During February's explosive meeting in the Oval Office, Zelensky's outfit became a bone of contention for Trump: 'He is all dressed up today' said the president in a sarcastic barb, referring to his Ukrainian counterpart's military-style attire. Sources told Axios that Zelensky will show up at the White House on Monday wearing the same black jacket he wore to a Nato summit in the Netherlands in June. 'It is going to be 'suit-style' but not a full suit,' one of the sources said. Russia has released a video purporting to show its troops entering the battlefield in a captured American-made M113 Armoured Personnel Carrier displaying the American and Russian flags. The Russian state-controlled outlet RT published the video on Telegram, saying that the footage was taken near the village of Mala Tokmachka in the Zaporizhzhia region. Andriy Yermak, Zelensky's chief adviser, shared the video with the caption: 'Russians are using the symbols of the United States in their own terroristic, aggressive war involving the killing of civilians.' 'This is the height of audacity,' he concluded. President Putin cannot be trusted and is not serious about peace, Sir Keir Starmer has said before his visit to the White House. The prime minister cited Russian drone attacks that killed six people in Kharkiv overnight, including two children, amid intensifying negotiations over a potential peace deal. The prime minister's spokesman said: 'President Putin's barbaric attacks on Ukraine continue. It is why we have always said there is one person who is able to end this war at any moment. President Putin has the choice to roll back his tanks and stop the bloodshed. President Putin has never been serious about peace. 'We have previously said we are never going to leave it down to trust when it comes to Putin. For more than ten years he has shown he cannot be trusted when it comes to peace. We have seen what happened before. Any end to the fighting — for that to be translated into a sustained peace — must be backed up by security guarantees.' Britain is prepared to put 'boots on the ground' in Ukraine to act as a guarantee in the event of a deal with Russia, Sir Keir Starmer has said. The prime minister's spokesman said that Britain and other allies, known as the 'coalition of the willing', were prepared to commit 'reassurance forces' to Ukraine. He said: 'We are ready to put UK boots on the ground in part to reassure Ukrainians but in part to secure safe skies, safe seas and regenerate Ukraine's armed forces. It is obviously welcome that President Trump has paved the way for vital US security guarantees.' Downing Street said Starmer accepted President Trump's suggestion that a ceasefire might not be needed to secure a lasting peace deal. 'The quicker you can bring about an end to the conflict and translate that into a lasting peace the better. We applaud President Trump's efforts to bring about an end to the killing. We want to see an end to the killing if you can bring about an end to the killing and a sustained peace in one go all the better.' Sir Keir Starmer has said he stands by his commitment to Ukraine retaining an 'irreversible path' to joining Nato after President Trump ruled out membership. The prime minister's spokesman said that Russia could not be allowed to have a 'veto' over Ukraine's membership of Nato and there could be no 'limitations'. The comments directly contradict Trump, who said at the weekend that 'there can be no going into Nato by Ukraine'. Downing Street said: 'Our position on Ukraine and Nato hasn't changed. Ukraine is on an irreversible path. Russia cannot have a veto over Ukraine's path to Nato.' Moscow is ready to hand over 31 civilians to Ukraine in return for the return of the same number of people to Russia, according to the Russian human rights commissioner Tatyana Moskalkova and reported by state news agency RIA. Moskalkova said 31 civilians from the Russian region of Kursk, where Ukrainian staged a major incursion last year, were still being held in Ukraine. She said she would meet shortly with her Ukrainian counterpart, Dmytro Lubinets. President Zelensky has described today's strikes on Ukraine 'cynical', and a deliberate attempt to frustrate the summit in Washington later today. 'This was a demonstrative and cynical Russian strike. They are aware that a meeting is taking place today in Washington that will address the end of the war,' he wrote on X. 'Putin will commit demonstrative killings to maintain pressure on Ukraine and Europe, as well as to humiliate diplomatic efforts. That is precisely why we are seeking assistance to put an end to the killings.' Zelensky added. 'Russia should not be rewarded for its participation in this war.' President Zelensky has said Russia deliberately attacked an energy facility in Ukraine's southern Odesa region belonging to Azerbaijan's Socar state oil company before the Washington summit. The oil depot was said to be completely destroyed after the after a 15-strong drone attack in the early hours of Monday morning. The depot was first attacked last week. After the first attack, in which several employees were seriously injured, Azerbaijan issued a statement promising to consider supplying weapons to Ukraine if strikes on its assets continued. As part of Baku's official stance of neutrality on the war, it has so far refrained from supplying weapons to either Russia or Ukraine, though it does send humanitarian aid to the latter. However, amid a diplomatic crisis with Moscow, officials have hinted that Azerbaijan could send Ukraine supplies from the country's existing arsenal, including Soviet-era and Russian-made weaponry. Ukraine's foreign minister said that Hungary 'can now send complaints' to Moscow, not Kyiv, after his Hungarian counterpart accused Ukraine of an attack on a Russian oil pipeline. Russian crude oil flows to Hungary were halted after a strike on a transformer station of the pipeline leading to Hungary. In a Facebook post, the Hungarian foreign minister, Peter Szijjarto, said Kyiv was behind the attack. Szijjarto said that he had talked to Russian deputy energy minister, Pavel Sorokin, who informed him that experts were working to restore the transformer station but it was unclear when deliveries will resume. Andrii Sybiha, Ukraine's foreign minister, neither confirmed nor denied the accusations in his statement on X. 'It is Russia, not Ukraine, who began this war and refuses to end it. Hungary has been told for years that Moscow is an unreliable partner. Despite this, Hungary has made every effort to maintain its reliance on Russia,' he said Hungary imports most of its crude oil via the Druzhba pipeline, which transports Russian crude through Belarus and Ukraine to Hungary and also Slovakia. President Putin will continue to inform foreign partners about the outcome of the Russia-US summit, the Interfax news agency reported on Monday, citing the Kremlin. On Sunday, the Putin held phone calls with the presidents of Belarus, Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan to discuss the results of Friday's summit in Alaska with President Trump. Putin is also reported to have discussed the summit with President Ramaphosa of South Africa. A Russian attack on the southeastern Ukrainian city of Zaporizhzhia killed three people and injured 20, the regional governor has said. Ivan Fedorov said on Telegram that 'many' of the injured were in critical condition after the Monday morning strike. Ukraine shot down more than 3,200 Russian Shahed-type drones from helicopters over the past year, Commander-in-Chief Oleksandr Syrskyi told RBC-Ukraine. Frequently used to target cities, including residential buildings and other civilian infrastructure, Shahed drones have become a central weapon in Moscow's long-range strikes against Ukraine, The Kyiv Independent reports. 'The army aviation has proven itself very well: helicopters equipped with machine guns are highly effective,' Syrskyi said. 'From August last year to August this year, they shot down more than 3,200 Shahed-type drones — these are impressive figures,' Syrskyi said. Originally designed in Iran and mass-produced in Russia under the name Geran-2, Ukraine has made countering Shahed drones a priority in its defence planning for this year, as Russia continues to scale up production. Ukraine's airforce reported that 6,129 Shahed drones were launched in July, surpassing June's 5,337 and a fourteen-fold increase compared with July last year. Solidifying the details of a security agreement is the 'most important goal' of President Zelensky and European leaders in America today, the Ukrainian MP Kira Rudik has said. She told Times Radio that ensuring President Putin did not attack Ukraine again if it agreed to a peace deal had been 'a complicated question that no one has wanted to tackle all along'. 'Right now, we are at the time when it has to be discussed, needs to be discussed, and President Trump sort of hinted that they have discussed it with Putin and the US are ready to provide security guarantees for Ukraine. 'President Zelensky needs to understand: what is that that is offered, and then try to perhaps craft some agreements between the US, Europe and Ukraine on how it would look.' Please enable cookies and other technologies to view this content. You can update your cookies preferences any time using privacy manager. The final stand for thousands of soldiers, rich in coal but ruined by war — no other territory in Ukraine has seen a similar toll as the eastern Donbas region (Anthony Loyd writes). Its fate may now decide the future of the war during today's meeting in Washington. Ukraine has clung to this industrial heartland ever since fighting erupted there in 2014, when pro-Russian separatists first began to clash with Ukrainian troops and declared Donetsk and Luhansk self-styled independent 'people's republics'. Yet now, despite holding on to 22 per cent of Donbas — about 6,600 sq km of land — Ukraine may be expected to surrender its most fortified defence lines after Putin demanded that it hand over this remaining territory, including strategic heights and fortified cities, as a condition to ending the war. • Read in full: The ball is in Zelensky's court but he is in an impossible position The Alaska summit between President Trump and President Putin on Friday was a 'shameful betrayal' of Ukraine and a 'Putin capitulation', Sir Iain Duncan Smith, the former leader of the Conservative Party, has said. The long-serving MP told Times Radio: 'America is blowing hot and cold about whether it thinks Ukraine is important.' He said Trump was 'repeating the mistakes of the past' and compared the possibility of the US forcing Ukraine to cede territory to 1938 when Britain and France demanded Czechoslovakia relinquish control of the Sudetenland territory to Germany in an effort to appease Hitler and avoid war. 'That then led to [Nazi Germany] taking over Czechoslovakia, moving into Poland, and the rest, of course, if brutal history,' Duncan Smith said. 'The West has become very weak militarily, but also in moral terms. We have no idea what we stand for,' he added. Please enable cookies and other technologies to view this content. You can update your cookies preferences any time using privacy manager. Russian media has sought to cast Ukraine's European allies as meddlers in the negotiations between Moscow and Washington before President Zelensky's meeting with Donald Trump. Derisively portraying them as Zelensky's 'support group', various media outlets suggested that they will attempt to sway Trump away from the peace terms laid out by President Putin in Alaska last week. In a leading article published in Izvestie entitled 'can the EU 'support group' influence the positions of Russia and the US', the pro-Kremlin publication said that Europe was becoming the 'main obstacle' to agreements made between Trump and Putin in Alaska. Komsomolskaya Pravda, another staunchly pro-Putin newspaper, said that letting Zelensky go to Washington alone after the Oval Office disaster in February was a 'lose-lose situation' for them. '[They would prefer for Zelensky] to be gagged, but then of course he wouldn't be able to refuse Trump, which is what this whole European gang is hoping for.' The death toll from a Russian drone attack on an apartment block in the Ukrainian city of Kharkiv has risen to six, the region's governor Oleh Syniehubov said on Telegram. 'A deceased person was found on the top floor of the damaged building,' said Syniehubov. He added that a search and rescue operation continues. Earlier Syniehubov wrote: 'A Russian drone attack on Kharkiv at dawn today took the lives of 5 people, including 2 children: 1.5 and 16 years old. We all sincerely hope that this number will not increase, as the debris clearance is still ongoing.' In its insider account of yesterday's European leaders' video conference, the Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera claims the Italian prime minister, Giorgia Meloni, warned against challenging President Trump over his handling of negotiations with President Putin. Corriere reported Meloni believes 'the risk is that if Trump is attacked, he will halt everything, effectively claim Ukraine doesn't want peace, Europe is not collaborating, and do what he wants, with the Americans making a deal directly with Russia.' The newspaper also claimed Meloni said it would be wise to ensure Trump and Zelensky do not have another impromptu press conference in the Oval Office, risking a repeat of their argument in February. Instead, it would be better to have them give separate statements to the press with no questions taken. Ukraine's airforce said on Monday that Russia had launched four missiles and 140 drones during an overnight attack on the country, as Moscow continues its slow assault pushing west. The airforce said it downed 88 drones and recorded hits in 25 locations across six Ukrainian regions — Donetsk, Kharkiv, Sumy, Dnipropetrovsk, Odesa and Kyiv — according to the statement posted on Telegram. Here is a map of the present front line, showing in detail the particularly contested Donetsk region. The Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera has reported that during Sunday's video conference held by European leaders, tension was evident between the Italian prime minister, Giorgia Meloni, and President Macron of France. Macron was 'not persuaded' when Meloni pushed the idea of offering security guarantees to Ukraine — an idea she claims she was the first to come up with. Instead, Macron argued for a European stability force in Ukraine. Meloni replied, 'Russia has 1.3 million soldiers. How many must we send to do the job?' Corriere reported, adding that Meloni proposed Rome as the location for a Trump-Zelensky-Putin meeting, while Macron prefers Geneva. The newspaper quotes unnamed Meloni aides stating the Italian prime minister does not rate Euro-leader video conferences highly, believing little is decided and Macron seizes the occasion to show 'he is the true leader of Europe'. China has called for 'all parties' involved in peace talks in Washington aimed at ending Russia's war in Ukraine to reach an agreement 'as soon as possible'. 'We hope that all parties and stakeholders will participate in the peace talks in a timely manner and reach a fair, lasting, binding and acceptable peace agreement to all parties as soon as possible,' the foreign ministry spokeswoman, Mao Ning, said at a news conference on Monday. Germany probably cannot deploy any troops to secure a peace deal in Ukraine without 'overstretching' its own armed forces, the country's foreign minister has said. Johann Wadephul, who is closely aligned with the chancellor Friedrich Merz, said the German military was already building up a 5,000-strong brigade in Lithuania and needed to concentrate on defending Nato territory. It is understood that Berlin is sceptical about sending soldiers into Ukraine on training missions and participating in any air policing mission over the west of the country, after both ideas were floated as potential security guarantees by British officials. President Trump is 'pushing for the real solution' in his talks with President Zelensky and European leaders today, one of Russia's lead negotiators has said. Kirill Dmitriev, who joined Putin in Alaska last week and who has previously taken part in talks in Washington, described Monday as 'the big day'. 'Let problem solving and peace prevail,' he wrote on X, along with an emoji of a dove. Born in Kyiv during the Soviet era, Dmitriev studied at school in the Ukrainian capital as a teenager. A former teacher has said he gave the impression of being 'delighted' when Ukraine gained independence from Moscow in 1991. He now serves as head of Russia's sovereign wealth fund. A minister has denied that Ukraine giving up territory to Russia as part of any peace deal would be rewarding Russian aggression. Stephen Kinnock, a health minister, told Times Radio the UK would recognise parts of Ukraine occupied by Russia officially becoming part of Putin's country, if Ukraine agreed to it. He denied it was a change in policy from the government. 'There has to be a just and durable peace, and that has to be backed up by very strong security guarantees — ironclad security guarantees — and that's why the European leaders are in Washington today,' Kinnock said. 'It's very good that President Zelensky is going to meet with President Trump today, and he's going with the full backing of European leaders, and President Zelensky has made it clear that if the terms of any agreement are not acceptable to him, he will not accept them.' President Zelensky must not be forced to accept a peace deal if he is not happy with the terms, the government has said before the arrival of European leaders in Washington later today. Speaking to Times Radio, Stephen Kinnock, a health minister, said that at the White House Sir Keir Starmer would make it 'absolutely clear that any decisions taken about Ukrainian territory must be taken with the agreement of the Ukrainian government and President Zelensky'. It was reported that during the Alaska summit between Trump and Putin on Friday the Russian leader demanded control of the entire Donbas region, even though Ukraine controls a meaningful share of it. Zelensky has said many times that he would never accept such a deal as it could create a launching pad for future Russian attacks. 'The government's been very consistent that decisions about Ukrainian territory are a matter for the Ukrainian government, for President Zelensky and the Ukrainian people,' Kinnock said. The death toll from a Russian drone attack on a five-storey apartment block in Kharkiv has increased to five, including two children, with 20 people wounded, Ukrainian authorities said. The pre-dawn attack reduced part of the building to rubble and sparked fires on at least three floors, the region's governor, Oleh Syniehubov, said on Telegram. 'The number of victims from the enemy UAV attack in Kharkiv has risen to 20,' wrote Synegubov. 'Five people died, including two children. The fifth victim is a woman, her details are being clarified.' Ukraine's state emergency service posted videos showing rescuers attempting to break through the rubble to reach a trapped resident, while another showed a floor in flames. The German foreign minister, Johann Wadephul, called for increased pressure on Russia and to push Moscow into concessions toward a 'just and lasting peace'. Wadephul spoke in Tokyo before President Trump's meeting with President Zelensky and European leaders, including the German chancellor, Friedrich Merz. 'It is probably not an exaggeration to say the whole world is looking to Washington,' he said at a press briefing alongside the Japanese foreign minister, Takeshi Iwaya, on Monday. 'Firm security guarantees are central' because 'Ukraine must be able to defend itself effectively even after a ceasefire and peace agreement,' he added. Wadephul also pushed for more aid for Ukraine. Ukrainian politicians have baulked at President Trump's proposal of security guarantees, warning that America failed to make good on the last defence assurance it gave to Kyiv after the end of the Cold War. Steve Witkoff, the US special envoy, said on Sunday that the US and European allies were 'potentially prepared to be able to give Article 5 security guarantees' to Ukraine. Under Nato's Article 5 contingency, if a member is attacked each member of the alliance will consider this an attack on all of them. Ukraine would not however be a Nato state under this arrangement. Solomiia Bobrovska, a member of the Ukrainian parliament's defence and intelligence committee, said that without Nato membership the guarantees were 'nothing … a big illusion.' She told The Times that the guarantees appeared to be a repeat of the Budapest Memorandum of 1994, when the nascent independent Ukrainian state agreed to give up its Soviet-era nuclear weapons in exchange for promises of security from Russia, the US and Britain. The lack of specificity in that agreement allowed Russia to attack Ukraine in 2014 without reprisal, critics say. 'No one can explain how it would work,' Bobrovska, deputy head of Ukraine's delegation to Nato, said of the present proposal. 'We have had this before in our history, 30 years ago.' Ukraine's foreign minister has said that Russia has continued to kill civilians despite peace efforts before the meeting between President Zelensky and President Trump. 'Russia is a murderous war machine that Ukraine is holding back. And it must be stopped through transatlantic unity and pressure,' Andrii Sybiha wrote on X about Russia's overnight attack on Kharkiv. 'Moscow must stop the killing in order to advance diplomacy,' he added. A Russian drone strike on a residential area in Kharkiv killed three people, including a child, and injured 17 people, according to Ukrainian authorities. Trump has said it is up to President Zelensky to end the war in Ukraine. 'President Zelenskyy of Ukraine can end the war with Russia almost immediately, if he wants to, or he can continue to fight,' the US president wrote on this Truth Social platform. 'Remember how it started. No getting back Obama given Crimea (12 years ago, without a shot being fired!), and NO GOING INTO NATO BY UKRAINE. Some things never change!!!' Shortly after Trump's comment, Zelensky said in a post on X: 'We all share a strong desire to end this war quickly and reliably. And peace must be lasting. 'Not like it was years ago, when Ukraine was forced to give up Crimea and part of our east, part of Donbas, and Putin simply used it as a springboard for a new attack. Or when Ukraine was given so-called 'security guarantees' in 1994, but they didn't work.' President Zelensky has said he hoped Ukraine's 'shared strength' with the US and European counterparts would compel Russia to peace. 'I am grateful to the president of the United States for the invitation. We all equally want to end this war swiftly and reliably,' Zelensky wrote on Telegram after arriving in the American capital on Sunday. 'And I hope that our shared strength with America and with our European friends will compel Russia to real peace.' President Trump has dropped his demand for a ceasefire in Ukraine because so much progress had been achieved in negotiations with Russia, his special envoy Steve Witkoff has claimed. Trump had insisted before his meeting with President Putin in Alaska that he would walk out if Russia did not agree to a ceasefire, and he faced widespread criticism in the United States over the weekend for apparently backing down from this demand. Witkoff, who was present at the meeting, claimed Trump 'pivoted' to seeking a peace deal after Putin made significant concessions in their meeting regarding land swaps and Nato-style security guarantees for Ukraine, Witkoff told CNN. 'The thesis of a ceasefire is that you'd be discussing all of these issues that we resolved in Alaska,' he said. 'We cut through all kinds of issues that would have to be discussed and agreed to during a ceasefire period.' • Read in full: Trump dropped ceasefire demand 'because so much progress was made' Russia claimed on Sunday that its forces captured the villages of Popiv Yar and Ivano-Darivka in the Donetsk region, as it was accused of exaggerating its gains in the strategically crucial region before a potential freezing of the front line. Ukraine, for its part, has been accused of underplaying its losses in Donetsk, the fiercest and most deadly front line in Ukraine, which has been thrown into the spotlight as it becomes a central bargaining chip in negotiations to end the war. Both sides are in a race to secure what they can before a possible cessation of hostilities. President Putin reportedly expects Ukrainian troops to withdraw from the parts of Donetsk it still controls in return for peace — an idea seemly backed by President Trump, but so far shunned by the Ukrainian president. A Russian overnight drone strike on a residential area in Kharkiv killed three people, including a child, and injured 17 people, according to Ukrainian authorities. The attack killed the two-year-old boy early on Monday, Oleh Synehubov, the governor of the wider Kharkiv region, said on Telegram. The number of the injured from the Kharkiv attack was 'continuously increasing', he added. The city's mayor Ihor Terekhov said on Telegram: 'As of now, three people died, including a small child. Another 17 people have been wounded, including six children.' The city near the Russian border was also hit hours earlier by a ballistic missile that injured at least 11 people, he said. Two people were injured in Russia's strikes on the adjacent region of Sumy that damaged at least a dozen homes and an educational institution, authorities said. President Zelensky will be supported by seven European leaders, including Sir Keir Starmer, at talks with President Trump in Washington on Monday. The Ukrainian leader and the 'coalition of the willing' want to hear details of Nato-style security guarantees pledged by Trump to respond to future Russian aggression before abandoning any territory to Moscow. Starmer will join President Macron of France, Friedrich Merz, the German chancellor, and Giorgia Meloni, the Italian prime minister, with the aim of avoiding a repeat of the public browbeating Zelensky received from Trump and JD Vance, the vice-president, at an Oval Office meeting in February. They will also be joined by Mark Rutte, Nato secretary-general, Ursula von der Leyen, head of the European Commission, and President Stubb of Finland, who has struck up a rapport with Trump over rounds of golf.
