Category: 2. World

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Reuters

Donald Trump’s special envoy is expected in Moscow days before the US president’s deadline on Friday for Russia to make progress on ending the war in Ukraine or face increased US sanctions.

Trump said Steve Witkoff would visit Moscow on Wednesday or Thursday. When asked what message Witkoff would take to Russia and what Vladimir Putin could do to avoid new sanctions, the US president answered: “Yeah, get a deal where people stop getting killed.”

In Kyiv, there is little expectation that Witkoff will make a breakthrough with Putin, but a hope that Trump’s changed rhetoric and tougher stance on Moscow may lead to a real change in US support for Ukraine. Sources in Kyiv said they expected Keith Kellogg, Trump’s Ukraine envoy, to visit the country towards the end of the week, possibly to coincide with Witkoff’s visit to Moscow.

Trump came into office convinced he could do a deal with Putin, but in recent weeks appears to have become increasingly frustrated with Russia’s actions. On Thursday he described its continued attacks on civilian areas in Ukraine as “disgusting” and on Sunday said that two nuclear submarines that he ordered to be deployed after online threats from the former Russian president Dmitry Medvedev were now “in the region”, without giving further details.

Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s chief of staff, Andriy Yermak, wrote on social media: “The concept of peace through strength works.”He added that the appearance of the submarines had silenced Medvedev, whom he described as “one Russian drunk who had just been threatening nuclear war on X”.

Trump had initially announced in July a 50-day deadline for Russia and Ukraine to end the war, but said last week he no longer believed Russia was serious about ending the war and shortened it to “10 or 12” days, later clarified as this Friday, 8 August.

Trump has previously said the new measures he has in mind if the deadline is not met could involve “secondary tariffs” targeting Russia’s remaining trade partners, such as China and India.

Mykhailo Podolyak, an aide to Volodymyr Zelenskyy, said if Russia did not change its course by Friday, Kyiv would expect the “irreversible logistics” of secondary sanctions on Russian oil exports to be set in motion.

“After that he’ll look whether this is helping to bring about the end of the war or not, and if not then he will move to the next step,” said Podolyak, in an interview in Kyiv.

The next move, he said, could be further sanctions, and the increased militarisation of Ukraine. “Trump has already said he’s ready to sell Europe as much weapons as they want [to pass to Ukraine]. Before he didn’t say that … This is already a different conception of the world,” he said.

Before that, though, all eyes will be on Witkoff’s visit to Moscow. On previous trips, he has held long one-on-one meetings with Putin and has spoken of his warm feelings for the Russian leader. On one occasion Putin gifted him an oil painting of Trump, on another, Witkoff arrived without an interpreter and used a Kremlin-provided translator.

The camaraderie has left both Kyiv and other US allies wondering whether Witkoff is capable of delivering harsh messages to Moscow, although his visit this week will be the first since Trump’s rhetoric on Ukraine became noticeably harsher.

The Kremlin said on Monday it was “always happy to see Mr Witkoff in Moscow” and a meeting with Putin was possible, the spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told reporters. He described talks with Witkoff as “important, substantive and very useful”.

Putin said on Friday that he was in favour of “a lasting and stable peace on solid foundations that would satisfy both Russia and Ukraine, and would ensure the security of both countries”.

Despite periodically making such statements, Putin has also made clear that Russia’s maximalist war goals remain essentially unchanged, demanding as a minimum control over four Ukrainian regions to which Moscow has laid claim, and a commitment that Ukraine will never join Nato.

Direct talks between Russia and Ukraine have taken place in Turkey, with the third round in Istanbul last month, but the last set of talks broke down in less than an hour and the only substantive outcome from the meetings has been a series of agreements on prisoner exchanges. Zelenskyy said on Sunday that a new exchange agreed at the last meeting in Istanbul would result in 1,200 Ukrainian troops returning home.

Zelenskyy has said he wants to meet directly with Putin, with Trump or Turkey’s Recep Tayyip Erdoğan as a mediator, but the Russian president has said he sees no point in a meeting until the outline of a ceasefire has been drawn up. However, the delegation he sent to Turkey, led by the former culture minister and patriotic author Vladimir Medinsky, suggests the Kremlin is not serious about a deal.

“Those countries who thought Russia was ready for talks, and that the war could end at any moment if Ukraine would only agree to negotiations, they can now see that Russia is not ready for any real talks,” said Podolyak.

Russia continues to target Ukraine with almost nightly drone and missile attacks. Last week was one of the deadliest for some time in terms of civilian casualties, with one set of attacks on Kyiv killing 31 people, including five children.

Both sides continue to target infrastructure in the opposing country with drones. Russia’s ministry of defence said on Monday that its air defences had intercepted 61 Ukrainian drones overnight.

Russian TikTokers arrested for posting video after oil depot attackpublished at 11:14 British Summer Time

11:14 BST

Image source, TikTok

Russian police have detained three young people who filmed themselves next to a blazing fuel depot near the city of Sochi following a reported Ukrainian drone attack on Sunday.

In the video, originally shared on TikTok, the trio can be seen rapping along to Crimson Dawn by Russian musicians Endshpil and Miyagi as the Rosneft-Kubannefteprodukt facility burns in the background.

According to local police, the three detainees are aged between 19 and 21.The 20-year-old woman who filmed the video was charged with behaving improperly during an emergency. She faces a fine of up to 30,000 rubles (£283; $375).

According to their social media profiles the women are called Karina and Daria and come from Nizhniy Tagil, an industrial city in the Ural mountains.

In a video posted by local police on Telegram, the young people say the came to Sochi to find work and apologise for filming and posting the video.

Local governor Veniamin Kondratyev said the fire was caused by drone debris hitting a fuel tank on Sunday.

Ukraine has not commented on this incident, but its armed forces have been targeting Russian energy and military infrastructure consistently throughout Russia’s full-scale invasion.

Pakistan on Monday unequivocally condemned the storming of the Al-Aqsa Mosque in occupied East Jerusalem by Israeli ministers, calling Tel Aviv out for its “shameless actions which are inflaming tensions in Palestine and the wider region”.

Early on Sunday, Israel’s far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, shielded by Israeli police, led a large group of illegal settlers in a provocative march and mass incursion into the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound, coinciding with the Jewish commemoration of Tisha B’Av, Anadolu Agency reported.

According to the Jerusalem Islamic Waqf, at least 1,251 illegal Israeli settlers stormed the mosque compound in the morning hours, performing Talmudic rituals, singing, and dancing under heavy police protection.

Al-Aqsa Mosque is the third holiest site in Islam after Makkah and Madina. Under a delicate decades-old “status quo” arrangement with Muslim authorities, the Al-Aqsa compound is administered by a Jordanian religious foundation, and Jews can visit but may not pray there.

“This sacrilege against one of Islam’s holiest sites is not only an affront to the faith of over a billion Muslims but also a direct assault on international law and the collective conscience of humanity,” Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif posted on X.

He said that such systematic provocations by the occupying power, coupled with reckless calls for annexation, imperilled the prospects for peace.

The prime minister said that Israel’s “shameless actions” were deliberately inflaming tensions in Palestine and the wider region, pushing the Middle East closer to further instability and conflict.

“Pakistan reiterates its urgent call for an immediate ceasefire, an end to all acts of aggression, and the revival of a credible peace process leading to an independent and viable State of Palestine, with Al-Quds Al-Sharif as its capital, in accordance with international law and relevant UN resolutions,” PM Shehbaz added.

The Foreign Office also issued a separate statement to condemn the Israeli move.

“The presence and statements of senior Israeli officials, and the repugnant declaration that ‘the Temple Mount is ours,’ are a dangerous and deliberate attempt to provoke religious sentiments across the world, escalate tensions, and alter the status of Al‑Aqsa Mosque,” the statement said.

It said that Israel’s expansionist attempts were a deliberate effort to destabilise the region and sabotage any meaningful path to peace.

“These provocations risk igniting a catastrophic spiral of violence across the region.”

The world, it continued, must not remain silent in the face of such systemic, illegal, inhumane, and unlawful aggression. Such actions constitute a blatant violation of international human rights and humanitarian laws, the United Nations Charter, as well as various UN and Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) Resolutions.

“We urge the international community, particularly the United Nations, to take immediate and concrete steps to hold Israel accountable for its illegal actions and to protect the religious sanctity of Al‑Aqsa Mosque and the rights of the Palestinian people, in particular the right to self-determination.

“Pakistan reaffirms its unwavering support for the creation of a sovereign, independent, viable, and contiguous Palestinian State based on pre-June 1967 borders, with Al-Quds Al-Sharif as its capital.”

Since October 7, 2023, Israeli strikes on Gaza have killed 60,839 and injured nearly 149,000 Palestinians, per the Palestinian health ministry. Bombardments have also destroyed 88 per cent of the Gaza Strip, according to the Gaza Media Office.

Pakistan has consistently raised its voice for the people of Palestine, calling for an immediate, unconditional and permanent ceasefire in Gaza.

Last month, Pakistan urged the UNSC not to remain “a bystander” amid the deepening humanitarian crisis in Gaza.

On July 29, Deputy Prime Minister Ishaq Dar said the Israel-Palestine question was a “test case” for the UN and the world as he addressed a high-level conference on the two-state solution in New York.

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With input from Reuters.