EU chief Ursula von der Leyen told the FT they had “pretty precise” plans to send troops to Ukraine as part of any peacekeeping mission. It comes as Russia said it would continue its invasion and Vladimir Putin arrived in China for an international summit. Follow the latest here.
Sunday 31 August 2025 23:42, UK
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Watch as China’s Xi Jinping hosts Vladimir Putin and other leaders at a banquet kicking off the summit in China…
Today marked the first day of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation summit in Tianjin.
Heads of state arrived, welcomed by China’s Xi Jinping, for a summit that takes place against a global backdrop of economic insecurity and wars in Europe and the Middle East.
Vladimir Putin was among the guests, with his appearance coming on the back of meeting with Donald Trump in Alaska earlier this month.
Guests today were treated to a banquet and a performance.
Tomorrow, the SCO summit will continue for its second day.
Analysts say the likes of Russia and China will seek to use the summit to suggest the US is no longer the hegemonic global power.
Expect more photo ops for the leaders present.
Then on Tuesday, Putin will sit down with Xi for face-to-face talks.
These are likely to be vital for the Russian leader, who’s reliant on Beijing’s trade – see our 20.23 post for Moscow correspondent Ivor Bennett’s analysis on what Putin’s hoping for.
But the main event is arguably on Wednesday.
Putin, alongside North Korea’s Kim Jong Un and Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian are expected to attend a Victory Day parade.
It marks the end of the Second World War following Japan’s formal surrender and will mark a significant public outing for the quartet dubbed the “axis of upheaval”.
The Kremlin is preparing to push out a senior official who suggested ending the war in Ukraine, according to reports.
The Institute for the Study of War said that this was “further indication” that Moscow had “no plans to end the war”.
Dmitry Kozak was once one of Vladimir Putin’s closest advisers, but seems to be on his way out.
The New York Times reported earlier this month that he had lost influence after suggesting that Putin move to end fighting.
Similarly, Russian outlet Vedomosti this week, citing two sources close to the presidential administration, said Kozak was a candidate for a new role far from Moscow.
In another report, it said there were also discussions about his resignation.
And on 29 August, Putin signed a decree abolishing two departments that Kozak previously headed up.
It all combines to suggest the once-powerful official is being knocked out of the Kremlin’s inner circle.
A suspect has been arrested after a Ukrainian politician was shot dead yesterday in Lviv, Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said.
Andriy Parubiy, a former speaker of Ukrainian parliament, was shot several times in the western city yesterday.
At the time, the attack was described as “carefully planned”.
A manhunt was launched, leading to today’s arrest in the Khmelnytskyi region, in western Ukraine.
Who was Parubiy?
Parubiy, 54, was a member of parliament when he was killed.
The politician was a leader of protests in 2013-14 calling for closer ties with the European Union – protests that brought down pro-Russian former President Viktor Yanukovych.
He became secretary of Ukraine’s National Security and Defence Council from February to August 2014, a period when fighting began in eastern Ukraine and Russia annexed the Crimea peninsula.
He was parliamentary speaker from April 2016 to August 2019.
Estonia and Latvia are today celebrating the anniversary of when the last Russian troops left the country 31 years ago.
Estonia’s foreign ministry shared an image of Russian vehicles being loaded onto a train during “the moment our independence was truly restored and our future opened.”
Latvia, meanwhile, described it as “achieved under difficult circumstances”.
The anniversaries carry extra significance as Ukraine continues to fight off Russia’s invasion.
A new survey says that the most trusted Ukrainian politician is Kyiv’s ambassador to the UK, and not President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
A study by Rating Group between 21-23 August finds that while Ukrainians want peace they want it only on condition of reliable security guarantees from its partners.
Its findings include:
Germany’s chancellor has said the country is preparing for a long war in Ukraine.
Friedrich Merz said he was hoping to “end it as quickly as possible,” but warned this wouldn’t come at the price of Ukraine’s “capitulation”.
In a statement shared on social media, Merz warned that if Ukraine were given up, then “tomorrow it will be the next country, and the day after tomorrow it will be us.”
Russia today also said it was prepared to keep fighting, and with a lack of progress since Donald Trump’s talks in Washington, it seems both sides expect the fighting to continue.
By Ivor Bennett, Moscow correspondent
Vladimir Putin doesn’t do four-day getaways to a single country very often.
His last was twenty years ago, to attend the 60th anniversary session of the UN General Assembly in New York in 2005.
The fact that his current visit to China is that length says a lot.
So does the timing – barely two weeks after the Russian president met Donald Trump in Alaska.
It feels like a very deliberate illustration of how close Moscow is to Beijing in the face of US attempts to weaken the relationship and its drive to end the war in Ukraine.
With China, the American president has tried the stick.
Threats of tariffs and secondary sanctions over its continued purchasing of Russian oil.
And with Russia, apparently the carrot too.
As well as renewed warnings of “massive” sanctions on Moscow, the Reuters news agency last week reported that US and Russian officials also discussed energy deals during recent negotiations, in the hope of incentivising the Kremlin to agree a peace deal, and to start diluting its bond with Beijing.
But Putin’s programme in China appears designed to emphasise that his relationship with Xi is stronger than ever.
After the two-day Shanghai Cooperation Organisation security summit, the pair will hold face-to-face talks on Tuesday, before Putin takes his place as guest of honour at a military parade on Wednesday that marks the 80th anniversary of Japan’s formal surrender in World War Two.
The symbolism is clear – Russia and China fought shoulder-to-shoulder against the enemies of the past, and they’ll remain united against the threats of the future.
There’ll be other powerful photo-ops too, namely with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who is among a string of leaders Putin will hold bilateral talks with.
A handshake and a smile on the summit sidelines just days after Trump hit India with 50% tariffs for buying Russian oil will be the diplomatic equivalent of blowing a raspberry in Washington’s direction.
For Russia, the whole visit feels like a pointed show of solidarity amid sanctions – that Moscow and its allies are immune to Western pressure.
But amid the symbolism, the Kremlin will be looking for substance here too.
Bilateral trade with China, which has helped keep the Russian economy afloat since the invasion of Ukraine, has started to fall in recent months.
After hitting a record high of $245bn in 2024, trade volumes have dipped by 8% since January.
And that’s particularly worrying for Moscow, with signs the economy could be on the brink of recession.
Putin will be hoping to arrest that slump and expand trade into new areas.
Most of all, though, I think he’ll be seeking a commitment from Russia’s economic partners that they won’t be going anywhere should the pressure increase.
Watch Bennett’s analysis here too…
Our Asia correspondent Helen-Ann Smith is in Tianjin, where the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation summit began today.
She analyses Beijing’s ambitions, Russia’s diplomatic win and the importance of India’s presence.
Watch her breakdown here…
Volodymyr Zelenskyy has issued a frontline update about the strategically important city of Pokrovsk.
“We are defending our positions, and the main thing is that this is our active defence – we are destroying the occupier every day,” Zelenskyy said.
He added that Kyiv was working to ensure it had the “necessary supplies” for its army throughout the Autumn.
A few hours earlier, the Ukrainian leader described Pokrovsk as the area where “the Russian army is concentrating the greatest efforts”.
It comes after earlier this month, on 12 August, Zelenskyy warned Russia may be sending 7,000 troops towards Pokrovsk.
In an interview on the same day, Ukraine’s intelligence chief Deputy Chief Major General Vadym Skibitskyi said that Russia planned to achieve all of its objectives around the likes of Pokrovsk – presumably seizing it – by the end of August and start of September.
Meanwhile, this week, a Russian war blogger claimed that Moscow’s forces had launched a series of strikes on the rear of the Ukrainian forces near Pokrovsk.
A separate Kremlin-affiliated blogger said on 29 August that Russian forces were trying to occupy the suburbs around the city to create a foundation from which they could seize it.
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