Putin, Trump to skip Ukraine’s peace talks that Russian leader proposed

Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin will not attend the talks in Turkiye. (AFP)
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Updated 15 May 2025
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Putin, Trump to skip Ukraine’s peace talks that Russian leader proposed

  • Peace talks are pencilled in for Thursday in Istanbul
  • Zelensky said he would attend talks only if Putin present

WASHINGTON/ISTANBUL: US President Donald Trump and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin will not attend what could be the first direct peace talks between Moscow and Kyiv in three years on Thursday, the Kremlin sending instead a group of experienced technocrats.
Putin on Sunday proposed direct negotiations with Ukraine in Istanbul on Thursday “without any preconditions.” Late on Wednesday, the Kremlin said the delegation would include presidential adviser Vladimir Medinsky and Deputy Defense Minister Alexander Fomin.
After the Kremlin’s delegation announcement, a US official said Trump would not attend — days after saying that he was considering the trip.
While Putin had never confirmed he would attend in person, the absence of the Russian and US presidents lowers the expectations for a major breakthrough in the war that Russia started in February 2022.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky had challenged the Kremlin leader to attend the talks “if he’s not afraid,” in an apparent contest to show Trump who wants peace more. Zelensky was on his way to Turkiye, a Ukrainian official said. Earlier, the Kyiv leader has said he would take part in the negotiations only if Putin were there.
Trump wants the two sides to sign up to a 30-day ceasefire to pause Europe’s biggest land war since World War Two, and a Russian lawmaker said on Wednesday there could also be discussions about a huge prisoner of war exchange.
Zelensky backs an immediate 30-day ceasefire, but Putin has said he first wants to start talks at which the details of such a ceasefire could be discussed.

More sanctions on russia?
Trump, who is growing increasingly frustrated with both Russia and Ukraine as he tries to push them toward a peace settlement, said he was “always considering” secondary sanctions against Moscow if he thought it was blocking the process.
US officials have spoken about possible financial sanctions as well as potential secondary sanctions on buyers of Russian oil.
A Ukrainian diplomatic source told Reuters on Wednesday that Ukraine’s leadership would decide on its next steps for peace talks in Turkiye once there was clarity on Putin’s participation.
The US delegation to Turkiye included Secretary of State Marco Rubio and senior envoys Steve Witkoff and Keith Kellogg.
Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha said early on Thursday he had met with Rubio to share Zelensky’s peace vision and “coordinate positions during this critical week.”
Medinsky and Fomin, part of the Russian delegation, took part in the last set of negotiations between the two sides in the first weeks of the war.
Direct talks between negotiators from Ukraine and Russia last took place in Istanbul in March 2022, a month after Putin sent tens of thousands of troops into Ukraine in what he calls a “special military operation” to root out neo-Nazis.
Ukraine and its allies say the invasion was an unprovoked, imperial-style land grab.


Thai PM claims she has coalition support after resignation calls

Updated 8 sec ago
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Thai PM claims she has coalition support after resignation calls

  • Paetongtarn Shinawatra has faced criticism for her perceived mishandling of a border row with Cambodia
BANGKOK: Thailand’s prime minister, seeking to fend off calls for her resignation, said on Sunday all coalition partners have pledged support for her government, which she said would seek to maintain political stability to address threats to national security.
Paetongtarn Shinawatra has faced criticism for her perceived mishandling of a border row with Cambodia, including over a phone call with the country’s former leader, Hun Sen, the audio of which was leaked on Wednesday.
After the initial leak, Hun Sen released the full audio, in which Paetongtarn appeared to kowtow before the veteran Cambodian politician and to denigrate a senior Thai military commander – crossing red lines for her critics and some former allies.
A major coalition partner, the Bhumjaithai Party, quit the ruling alliance soon after the leak, overshadowing Paetongtarn’s premiership and a parliamentary majority cobbled together by her Pheu Thai party.
“The country must move forward. Thailand must unite and push policies to solve problems for the people,” Paetongtarn, the daughter of influential former premier Thaksin Shinawatra, posted on X after a meeting with coalition partners, including the United Thai Nation party.
Prior to the post, the UTN had looked set to demand her resignation in return for backing the ruling coalition.
The government and the country’s influential military share a common position, to back democratic principles and follow the provisions of the constitution, said the 38-year-old leader, a political neophyte who was appointed prime minister last year.
Activists, among them groups with a history of influential rallies against the Shinawatra administration, have scheduled a protest in Bangkok starting on June 28 to demand Paetongtarn’s resignation.

Ukraine army chief vows to expand strikes on Russia

Updated 6 min 8 sec ago
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Ukraine army chief vows to expand strikes on Russia

  • Commander Syrsky said Ukraine would continue its strikes on Russian military targets, which he said had proved “effective"

KYIV: Ukraine’s top military commander vowed to increase the “scale and depth” of strikes on Russia in remarks made public Sunday, saying Kyiv would not sit idly by while Moscow prolonged its three-year invasion.
Diplomatic efforts to end the war have stalled in recent weeks.
The last direct meeting between the two sides was almost three weeks ago and no follow-up talks have been scheduled.
Russian attacks on Ukraine have killed dozens of people during the interim, including in the Ukrainian capital Kyiv, according to officials.
“We will not just sit in defense. Because this brings nothing and eventually leads to the fact that we still retreat, lose people and territories,” Ukrainian commander-in-chief Oleksandr Syrsky told reporters including AFP.
Syrsky said Ukraine would continue its strikes on Russian military targets, which he said had proved “effective.”
“Of course, we will continue. We will increase the scale and depth,” he said.
Ukraine has launched retaliatory strikes on Russia throughout the war, targeting energy and military infrastructure sometimes hundreds of kilometers from the front line.
Kyiv says the strikes are a fair response to deadly Russian attacks on Ukrainian infrastructure and civilians.


In wide-ranging remarks, Syrsky also conceded that Russia had some advantages in drone warfare, particularly in making fiber-optic drones that are tethered and difficult to jam.
“Here, unfortunately, they have an advantage in both the number and range of their use,” he said.
He also claimed that Ukraine still held 90 square kilometers (35 square miles) of territory in Russia’s Kursk region, where Kyiv launched an audacious cross-border incursion last August.
“These are our pre-emptive actions in response to a possible enemy offensive,” he said.
Russia said in April that it had gained full control of the Kursk region and denies that Kyiv has a presence there.
Moscow occupies around a fifth of Ukraine and claims to have annexed four Ukrainian regions as its own since launching its invasion in 2022 — in addition to Crimea, which it captured in 2014.
Kyiv has accused Moscow of deliberately sabotaging a peace deal to prolong its full-scale offensive on the country and to seize more territory.
The Russian army said Sunday that it had captured the village of Petrivske in Ukraine’s northeast Kharkiv region.
Russian forces also fired at least 47 drones and three missiles at Ukraine between late Saturday and early Sunday, the Ukrainian air force said.
At least two people were killed in the attacks on Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region, including a 17-year-old boy, the region’s governor said.


Pope Leo urges international diplomacy to prevent ‘irreparable abyss’

Updated 18 min 36 sec ago
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Pope Leo urges international diplomacy to prevent ‘irreparable abyss’

VATICAN CITY: Pope Leo on Sunday said the international community must strive to avoid war that risks opening an “irreparable abyss,” and that diplomacy should take the place of conflict.
US forces struck Iran’s three main nuclear sites overnight, joining an Israeli assault in a major new escalation of conflict in the Middle East as Tehran vowed to defend itself.
“Every member of the international community has a moral responsibility: to stop the tragedy of war before it becomes an irreparable abyss,” Pope Leo said during his weekly prayer with pilgrims.
“No armed victory can compensate for the pain of mothers, the fear of children, the stolen future. Let diplomacy silence the weapons, let nations chart their future with peace efforts, not with violence and bloody conflicts,” he added.
“In this dramatic scenario, which includes Israel and Palestine, the daily suffering of the population, especially in Gaza and other territories, risks being forgotten, where the need for adequate humanitarian support is becoming increasingly urgent,” Pope Leo said.


Winds fuel fears of new Croatia wildfires

Updated 29 min 57 sec ago
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Winds fuel fears of new Croatia wildfires

ZAGREB: Firefighters in southern Croatia were on high alert Sunday in fear that expected strong winds could rekindle blazes in the Balkan nation.
Crews, with the help of water bombers, managed to get control Saturday over wildfires on the southern Adriatic coast, after a series of blazes started in recent days.
The fires, near Croatia’s second largest city Split, that started Saturday morning close to the coastal village of Pisak was put under control but were still smoldering.
They have burnt 300 hectares (740 acres) and dozen of houses, authorities said.
According to the Split-Dalmatia county firefighting commander, Ivan Kovacevic during the night several small fires were put down by the firefighters.
“The damage is huge, but it could have been bigger having given the number of structures that were threatened,” Kovacevic said.
No death have been report, while one firefighter and some civilians have suffered minor injuries.
According to Civil protection headquarters at least 94 people, mostly tourists were evacuated in Omis, but late Saturday they returned to their accommodation.
Deputy prefect of Split-Dalmatia county, Stipe Cogelja said the village of Marusic on the Adriatic coast suffered the most damages, adding it was “pure luck” that no one had died.
Police said they are “intensively investigating” the possibility of arson in the fires and called on the citizens to help by immediately reporting any suspicious behavior.


Iran’s Paris-based opposition head says time for Khamenei to go, after US hits nuclear sites

Updated 22 June 2025
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Iran’s Paris-based opposition head says time for Khamenei to go, after US hits nuclear sites

PARIS: Maryam Rajavi, head of the Paris-based opposition National Council of Resistance of Iran said on Sunday that Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei was responsible for the nuclear program that had now “gone up in smoke” and needed to go.
“Now Khamenei must go. The Iranian people welcome the end of the war and seek peace and freedom,” she said in a statement, following unprecedented US strikes that President Donald Trump said had “obliterated” its key nuclear facilities.
“Khamenei is responsible for an unpatriotic project that, in addition to costing countless lives, has cost the Iranian people at least $2 trillion— and now, it has all gone up in smoke.”