Donald Tusk, the Polish president, has claimed Russia has planned terror attacks in the air against Poland and other countries. Meanwhile, Donald Trump’s advisers have conceded that a peace deal will likely take months – after the president-elect claimed he could end the war on “day one”.
Thursday 16 January 2025 07:31, UK
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Sir Keir Starmer has just arrived in Kyiv for his first trip to Ukraine as prime minister.
The prime minister was greeted at Kyiv railway station by the UK ambassador to Ukraine, Martin Harris, and Ukraine’s envoy to London, Valerii Zaluzhnyi.
Sir Keir plans to sign a new long-term partnership deal with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy later today.
We won’t have a Ukraine blog today – instead you can follow live coverage of Starmer’s visit in our excellent Politics Hub…
We’re pausing our coverage of the war in Ukraine for now, thanks for following along.
Before we go, here’s a round-up of the key events from today:
We can bring you some images of Ukrainian prisoners of war returning home now, after a swap with Russia that we reported on earlier (see 12.16pm post).
“Today, 25 more of our people are returning home to Ukraine. These are our military and civilians,” Volodymyr Zelenskyy said of the swap.
“The guys have serious injuries and illnesses. Each of them will receive all the necessary medical care,” he said.
He also thanked the United Arab Emirates for its help in mediating the deal.
Joe Biden will mark the end of his term this evening when his final major speech as president is broadcast.
Biden has consistently called on the incoming Donald Trump to keep up funding for Ukraine after the Democrat leaves, but the Republican has signalled his stance is to seek peace as soon as possible.
Under his premiership, the US has committed nearly $200bn in weapons, aid, or ammunition for Ukraine since Russia’s invasion in 2022.
Analysts have noted that the outgoing Biden has “left it late” to push through a series of new bills and sanctions on the Russian regime.
A wave of sanctions hit Russian oil tankers and producers last week, and fresh sanctions were announced just this afternoon (see previous post).
Donald Trump will be inaugurated as president next Monday.
You can read more about what that may mean in our 9.57am post, or ask a question for one of our experts by clicking on the link in our 1.45pm post.
The US has issued fresh Russia-related sanctions, according to the Treasury.
Multiple individuals, a China-based entity and a bank in Kyrgyzstan have all been named in the latest wave of sanctions – which come in the dying days of Joe Biden’s premiership.
Analysts have noted that the outgoing Biden has “left it late” to push through a series of new bills and sanctions on the Russian regime in anticipation of Donald Trump’s imminent return to the White House.
A wave of sanctions hit Russian oil tankers and producers just last week.
“The new team is setting up for a negotiation, and in a negotiation, you need leverage, and part of that leverage has to come from the kind of economic pressure that makes Putin see he’s going to continue to pay a significant price economically,” security adviser Jake Sullivan said on Monday.
The return of Russian-occupied parts of Ukraine to Kyiv in a potential peace deal is “not even up for discussion”, a senior Putin aide has said.
Nikolai Patrushev rejected the suggestion that Russia could be persuaded to cede any parts of the Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhia, and Kherson oblasts it currently holds.
In an interview published yesterday in Russian outlet Komsomolskaya Pravda, he said the idea was “not even up for discussion”.
He repeated long-standing Russian claims that sham elections in the regions in September 2022 made them effectively Russian territory.
He also appeared to suggest that international recognition of the territories, as well as Crimea, as Russian may be central to any future peace deal.
Over at the Kremlin, Russian President Vladimir Putin has been chairing a meeting of the Pobeda organising committee via videoconference.
The Pobeda (meaning “victory”) is the Russian annual parade in which Soviet success again Nazi Germany in the Second World War is celebrated.
More from Poland, where Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Donald Tusk are hosting a news conference.
The Ukrainian leader was asked about reports that foreign troops could be sent to enforce a ceasefire line should some sort of peace deal be reached.
Zelenskyy said that deployment of foreign troops in Ukraine could only be a part of security guarantees and would not be enough alone.
He also said he would discuss the issue with Sir Keir Starmer.
Donald Trump will be inaugurated as US president for the second time on Monday.
We’ll be covering the event live – starting with a live Q&A with our correspondents on Friday afternoon.
Do you have questions about how the returning Trump could affect the war in Ukraine?
Submit a question by clicking the link below.
Donald Tusk, Poland’s prime minister, has vowed to use Warsaw’s presidency of the European Union to push forward Ukraine’s request to join.
Different countries take over as president of the EU on a rotating basis, with Poland in charge at present.
“We will break the standstill we have in this issue,” Tusk said.
“We will accelerate the accession process.”
Zelenskyy expects US to continue support
On a different topic, Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that he expected the US would continue to strengthen Ukraine after Donald Trump’s inauguration next week.
The Ukrainian leader reiterated that Ukraine was seeking “strong” security guarantees and urged support to the Ukrainian army as the war approaches its three-year mark.
The two also discussed Ukraine’s production process, and found “common language” on the exhumation of bodies relating to the Volhynia killings that took place from 1943 to 1945, they said at a joint news conference.
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