#UKRAINE WAR

Outgoing chancellor Olaf Scholz had ruled out sending them to Kyiv.

The Kremlin said on Sunday contacts with U.S. President Donald Trump's team were moving ahead very well but that it was too early to expect instant results due to the level of damage done to relations under Trump's predecessor Joe Biden.

Defense ministers from some 30 countries met in Brussels on Thursday to discuss a “reassurance force” for Ukraine in the event of a ceasefire in the war with Russia but key questions about its mission and any U.S. support remained unanswered.

France's defense budget should reach €100 billion a year in the future, the minister said.

A Slovakian delegation, including the deputy parliament speaker, arrived in Moscow on Sunday as Bratislava seeks a solution following Ukraine's decision to halt Russian gas pipeline deliveries to Europe.

U.S. president-elect Donald Trump held his first post-election conversation with Russian president Vladimir Putin on Thursday, advising him against escalating the war in Ukraine, sources familiar with the call have said.

Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk has said that he will soon meet European leaders and the head of NATO to discuss transatlantic cooperation and the war in Ukraine in the context of the ‘new political landscape.’

Russia has granted citizenship to more than 3,300 foreigners this year as a reward for their participation in Moscow’s offensive in Ukraine, a spokesperson for the Russian Interior Ministry has revealed.

Ukrainian forces are restraining one of Russia’s most powerful offensives since the start of Moscow’s full-scale invasion on its smaller neighbor, the top commander of Kyiv's forces said on Saturday.

Poland will need a much larger army, something that could be hard to achieve given its aging population, if it is to defend itself from what seems to be a war this generation will inevitably face, Poland’s top general Wiesław Kukuła has said.

Russia handed down a 14-year prison sentence to a Crimean man on Friday, accusing him of treason for allegedly aiding the Ukrainian military.

A Russian military court has sentenced the former editor of an independent anti-war youth magazine to seven years in prison over two posts she published online showing support for Russian political prisoners.

Ukrainian troops are suffering high losses because Western arms are arriving too slowly to equip the armed forces properly, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy told CNN in an interview aired on Sunday.

U.S. President Joe Biden is looking forward to discussing Ukraine’s war strategy with President Volodymyr Zelenskiy this month and Washington is working on a “substantial” new aid package, White House National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said on Saturday.

European nations need to be more forceful in expressing concern over China’s growing defense ties with Russia, U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Kurt Campbell has said.

The West must do everything in its power to provide Ukraine with effective air defense systems to repel Russian attacks, Polish Foreign Minister Radosław Sikorski has said.

TVP World’s guest was Péter Krekó, director of a Hungary-based think tank.

One civilian was killed and four others injured in Russian shelling overnight on Ukraine’s Sumy region on the border between the two warring countries, the local Ukrainian administration said on Sunday.

The Kursk offensive has forced Russia to relocate some 30,000 troops from Ukraine to bolster its defense in the western region, Kyiv’s top general said on Tuesday.

Pavel Durov was detained in France on Saturday.