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US and Russian leaders were reported to be meeting in Budapest this week to discuss Ukraine
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Russia has admitted it has “no idea” when a highly-anticipated summit between President Donald Trump and President Vladimir Putin will take place.
There had been speculation that the summit would take place in Budapest, Hungary this week.
An in-person meeting between US Secretary of State Marco Rubio and his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov was also delayed due to divergences in opinions on a ceasefire, according to CNN.
The meeting was expected to be a forerunner to the meeting between Trump and Putin, which led to speculation that the Trump-Putin meeting may also be pushed back.
Leaders of nations including the UK, Germany, France, Ukraine and the European Union backed calls for the fighting to “stop immediately” on Tuesday.
“We strongly support President Trump’s position that the fighting should stop immediately, and that the current line of contact should be the starting point of negotiations,” a statement, published by several European governments including the UK on Tuesday, said.
People gather next to destroyed shops following what local authorities called a Ukrainian overnight drone attack in the course of Russia-Ukraine conflict, in Bataysk in the Rostov region, Russia on 21 October 2025.
Ukraine’s allies are concerned over the war-hit nation’s position on the battlefield and diplomatically, amid fears that Donald Trump and Russian president Vladimir Putin could sign a bad ceasefire deal, weakening all of Europe.
The outcome of their meeting could be a disaster not just for Ukraine but also for Europe, European officials have said.
“We see president Trump’s efforts to bring peace to Ukraine. Of course all these efforts are welcome, but we don’t see Russia really wanting peace,” top EU diplomat Kaja Kallas told reporters in Luxembourg yesterday.
“Russia only understands strength.”
Ukraine and its allies have long called for an immediate ceasefire with troops in place, while Moscow has demanded Ukraine cede further territory before it would halt fighting.
Russia’s military has said it is paying close attention as Nato’s ongoing nuclear deterrence exercise gets underway, the Kremlin said on Tuesday.
It said it will carefully analyse its progress and intent, as it takes place in the Netherlands.
The Steadfast Noon exercise began last week and involved 71 aircrafts from 41 nations.
After speculation that a highly-anticipated meeting between US President Donald Trump and Russia’s President Vladimir Putin would take place in Budapest this week, the Kremlin has announced that no date has been set for the summit.
Trump had said that a summit could take place within two weeks, but Moscow never provided any timings.
CNN reported that a meeting between US Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov had been postponed due to divergences about a possible end to the war.
External power to the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plan will be restored by Saturday, Russian management told Reuters on Tuesday.
The plant has had no power since late September, and work began on 18 October. It produces no electricity at the moment, but requires power to ensure nuclear reactors remain cool to prevent a meltdown.
The IAEA warned that backup diesel generators failed “it could lead to a complete blackout and possibly causing an accident with the fuel melting and a potential radiation release into the environment, if power could not be restored in time”.
Russia seized Zaporizhzhia, the largest nuclear power plant in Europe, shortly after its invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
Russian troops have pushed into the eastern Ukrainian city of Pokrovsk – and immediately begun the casual commission of war crimes, with the murder of at least three civilians who were trying to flee the invaders.
In footage shared with The Independent, an elderly woman lies on the verge of a road by a level crossing not far from the railway tracks on the outskirts of the city. She is wounded, and still.
A few yards away, a body lies on its back – inert, dead. Nearby, another victim lies collapsed next to the bicycle they had loaded with supplies before desperately bumping the wheels over the rails as the enemy approached. Slow and awkward, he or she must have been an easy target for Vladimir Putin’s vanguard.
World affairs editor Sam Kiley from Kramatorsk, eastern Ukraine:
Russian state media, RIA, has reported that 55 Ukrainian drones were destroyed by Russian air defence systems overnight.
Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky has requested US-made Tomahawk missiles to allow it to carry out attacks deep in Russian territory.
Poland has warned Russian President Vladimir Putin against travelling through its airspace for an impending summit in Hungary with US President Donald Trump.
The International Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant against Putin in 2023, accusing him of the war crime of illegally deporting hundreds of children.
“I cannot guarantee that an independent Polish court won’t order the government to escort such an aircraft down to hand the suspect to the court in The Hague,” Poland’s Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski told Radio Rodzina.
“I think the Russian side is aware of this. And, therefore, if this summit is to take place, hopefully with the participation of the victim of the aggression, the aircraft will use a different route.”
The ICC warrant obligates member states to arrest Putin if he sets foot in their territory.
Last month, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was forced to avoid the airspace of several countries due to an ICC arrest warrant also issued against him for alleged war crimes.
Poland has a tense relationship with Russia, after the country engaged in drone incursions into its airspace last month, prompting its foreign minister to demand the imposition of a no-fly zone.
Poland’s Prime Minister Donald Tusk has confirmed that Polish security services detained eight people suspected of preparing to carry out acts of sabotage in various regions on Tuesday.
“ABW (the internal security agency), in cooperation with other services, detained eight people in various parts of the country in recent days, suspected of preparing acts of sabotage,” the Polish leader wrote on X/Twitter.
“Further operational activities are continuing,” he added.
On X, the minister responsible for special services, Tomasz Siemoniak, said, “The matters … concern reconnaissance of military facilities and critical infrastructure elements, the preparation of means to carry out acts of sabotage, and the direct execution of attacks.”
Officials have reported being attacked with the use of arson and cyberattacks as part of a “hybrid war” waged by Russia to affect nations supporting Ukraine. Russia has denied the accusations.
A Russian attack on energy infrastructure in Ukraine’s northern region of Chernihiv has led to power cuts affecting “hundreds of thousands” of people.
“Emergency crews in Chernihiv region are unable to begin work on restoring power supply due to continuous attacks by Russian drones,” Ukraine’s energy ministry said in a statement on Telegram on Tuesday.
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