AI-Summary – News For Tomorrow
Ukraine averted a potential Trump-induced crisis with productive US talks. Recent actions include Ukraine firing US-made ATACMS missiles at Russia, new US sanctions on Russian oil, and a US agreement to upgrade Ukraine’s Patriot missile defense. Zelenskyy addressed the Swedish parliament, emphasizing Putin’s desire for legal recognition of stolen territory. Europe, surprised by the peace plan, struggled to form an alternative, omitting territorial concessions. There’s concern Moscow will manipulate Trump by portraying Europeans as incapable negotiators. A Russian MP suggested a direct Russia-US deal, disregarding European involvement.
News summary provided by Gemini AI.
Ukraine has managed to step back from the brink of another Trump-fuelled crisis. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio emerged from talks on Sunday calling it “probably the most productive day we have had on this issue, maybe in the entirety of our engagement.”
Just last week Kyiv openly announced it had fired US-made long-range ATACMS missiles at Russia. New US sanctions on Russia’s biggest oil giants took effect. And the US agreed to sell Ukraine an upgrade package for its patriot missile-defence system.
“Putin wants legal recognition to what he has stolen, to break the principle of territorial integrity and sovereignty,” Zelensky told the Swedish parliament in a virtual address Monday morning. “That’s the main problem.”
And Europe, seemingly also blindsided by this peace plan, has failed to coalesce around an alternative. Several versions of a European counterproposal were floating around on Sunday, all of which removed (among other things) specific clauses on Ukrainian territorial concessions.
“But there’s a risk that Moscow will shift the responsibility onto the Europeans, and tell Trump how incapable they are of negotiating, and the American plan is quite acceptable (with TINY, around 90% or so, little revisions. Just cosmetic changes, Donald, don’t worry.)”
“I don’t think anyone cares about Europe,” said Russian MP and journalist Evgeny Popov in written comments to CNN Monday. “I believe in Russia-US deal.”
