Sir Keir Starmer has said for the first time it is British policy to “put Ukraine in the strongest possible position for negotiations” in a significant shift. But a thinktank warns Vladimir Putin is only interested in the “total capitulation” of Ukraine – not a negotiated settlement.
Tuesday 3 December 2024 07:42, UK
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
Vladimir Putin and Alexander Lukashenko will sign a landmark security pact later this week that reflects global geopolitical changes, according to Russian state news agency RIA.
This new agreement will be one of several documents the two leaders will sign in Minsk on Friday, where the pair are meeting to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the “Union State” – an alliance and borderless union between Russia and Belarus.
“We are covering the topics of state, public, economic security, talking about ensuring stability in the development of our economies,” RIA agency quoted Belarusian deputy foreign minister Igor Nazaruk as saying.
“It is designed to take into account the changed external conditions, when the world is moving to a polycentric world order,” he added, describing what he called a “landmark” agreement.
Aside from those comments, RIA shared no other details.
By Dominic Waghorn, international affairs editor
Russia may be reaching the limit of its ability to support a war it is undoubtedly winning, drafting in North Korean and Yemeni troops to avoid an unpopular second mobilisation of Russians.
And with inflation soaring the Russian economy is creaking.
But Donald Trump, the US president-elect, seems determined to press on and expedite negotiations and other leaders, including Ukraine’s own and now Britain’s, seem ready to accept their inevitability.
Sir Keir gave the impression negotiations were around the corner.
That could be jumping the gun.
We have no idea when they will start, if they do.
For some, Sir Keir’s words will be overhasty.
Many would prefer Europe to hold the line, even if the US is about to walk away from giving Ukraine the military support it has relied on for two years.
These images show Moscow’s troops training in the southern Russian region of Krasnodar.
The soldiers are learning how to operate a Soviet-era T-72 tank.
The tank first entered production in 1973, with Moscow relying increasingly on older equipment as its war in Ukraine nears its fourth year.
Prominent voices within the Russian information space are consistently emphasising that Vlaidmir Putin has no interest in a negotiated settlement with Ukraine, suggesting he will not engage in anything “that results in anything less than total Ukrainian capitulation”, a thinktank has observed.
The US-based Institute for the Study of War (ISW) noted comments made by Kremlin affiliate and Russian oligarch Konstantin Malofeev to the Financial Times that Putin will likely reject any plan for peace negotiations that Donald Trump puts forth unless the plan accounts for Russia’s “security concerns”.
Malofeev laid out several conditions for Putin to consider negotiations:
“Malofeev’s interview further indicates that the Kremlin is not interested in good faith negotiations, no matter who mediates such talks,” the ISW assessed.
It added that Malofeev does not hold an official position within the Russian government, “but his rhetoric is important given his relationships with high-level Kremlin officials and the influence of Tsargrad (the TV channel he owns) among Russian ultranationalists”.
“Malofeev’s comments indicate that Putin remains averse to good faith negotiations and is committed to destroying the Ukrainian state through military means,” the ISW added.
By Dominic Waghorn, international affairs editor
Sir Keir Starmer has for the first time said it was British policy to “put Ukraine in the strongest possible position for negotiations”.
During a speech at the Lord Mayor’s Banquet in London on Monday, the prime minister said he wants Ukraine to be in a position of strength “so they can secure a just and lasting peace on their terms that guarantees their security, independence – and right to choose their own future”.
But make no mistake. This is a significant shift.
Watch the PM’s comments here…
Only last month, both Sir Keir and French President Emmanuel Macron were promising to “support Ukraine unwaveringly and for as long as necessary to thwart Russia’s war of aggression”.
In the summer, his predecessor Rishi Sunak stated British policy on Ukraine was based on the principle that “aggression cannot and will not prevail” while also talking of a just and lasting peace “based on international law and the UN charter”.
If negotiations happen and settle on some kind of compromise, as they always do, Russian aggression will have prevailed to some extent at least.
If Russia, as many seem to expect, walks away with de facto control of at least part of the chunk of Ukraine it has taken by force and wins a commitment Ukraine will not join NATO for the foreseeable future, Vladimir Putin will have been vindicated, at least in part.
His decision to wield naked unprovoked brutal aggression against a neighbour will have achieved some of its ends.
That Western leaders are now talking about negotiations between Ukraine and Russia will, say critics, be a sign of their abject failure to “thwart Russian aggression”.
The West failed to deter Russia from invading Ukraine, hoping the threat of “swift punitive” financial sanctions would suffice.
Then it failed to act with sufficient urgency and unity to help Ukraine repel that invasion.
Welcome back to our live coverage of the war in Ukraine.
Yesterday, a former Ukrainian foreign minister warned that his country does not have the means to “turn the tables” in the war.
Dmytro Kuleba warned that Ukraine would lose the conflict if it continued fighting in the same way.
He told the Financial Times that the situation on the battlefield “looked bad”.
Later on yesterday, Sir Keir Starmer appeared to shift his policy position on support for Ukraine, saying the UK would do everything it could to put Kyiv in the “strongest possible position for negotiations”.
We’ll be bringing you the latest updates throughout the day, but before we do, here’s a reminder of the other key developments from the past 24 hours:
Here’s a look at what’s been happening on the ground:
That’s the end of our live coverage of the war in Ukraine for this evening.
Today, former Ukrainian foreign minister Dmytro Kuleba warned Ukraine does not have the means to “turn the tables” in the war and will lose if it carries on like it is now.
Speaking to the Financial Times, he said things “look bad” on the battlefield.
It came as reports suggested Russia has fired at least 60 North Korean-supplied ballistic missiles against Ukraine during the war.
Ukrainian military spokesperson Andrii Chernyak said that although such missiles lacked accuracy, they still posed a serious danger to Ukraine.
In the US, two American officials said the country was preparing to send an extra $725m in military assistance to Ukraine.
Counter-drone systems and munitions for its High Mobility Artillery Rocket System are included in the package, which could indicate more of the longer-range missiles are headed to the battlefield.
We’ll be back with all the latest updates tomorrow…
Russian forces have been fighting behind “established Ukrainian defences”, the UK’s defence ministry has said.
According to The Telegraph, it said Russian troops had captured swathes of territory in “less well-defended” sectors of the southern Donbas region.
“Russian forces have made rapid advances towards the eastern flank of Velyka Novosilka… a lynchpin of Ukraine’s defensive line,” the ministry said.
It added that the fall of Vuhledar in October had broken Ukrainian defences in the area.
“This enabled increased Russian advances into less well-defended areas,” the newspaper reported it as saying during a weekend briefing.
Velyka Novosilka is a rural settlement that lies on the border of the Donetsk and Dnipropetrovsk regions.
The US-based thinktank the Institute for the Study of War recently said the Russian military was planning to advance west from the settlement and then turn north to take on Ukrainian forces in the town of Pokrovsk.
A Russian agent spoke about sending a “true sexy bitch” to “honeytrap” an award-winning journalist in a spy plot, a court has been told.
“Rupert Ticz”, aka Austrian national Jan Marsalek, exchanged a series of messages with lead spy Orlin Roussev about the operation on Bellingcat investigative journalist Christo Grozev in 2021, the Old Bailey heard.
The pair discussed engineering a fake romance between Mr Grozev and London-based beautician Vanya Gaberova in an encrypted chat.
Gaberova, 30, had travelled to Valencia in Spain as part of a team to spy on Mr Grozev at a conference in the Palace Hotel which was also attended by Bellingcat founder Eliot Higgins, jurors were told.
Roussev had noted that Mr Grozev had “very quickly” accepted a Facebook request from Gaberova.
On 28 September 2021, he told Marsalek that their target “seems hooked and in love with Vanya” and had started “liking” her pictures and posts.
“We can move slowly to romance. We slowly push for a date,” he wrote in a message.
Marsalek queried whether she “would be up for that” and warned: “Let’s wait a little, let’s not under-estimate the guy and his paranoia.”
“I hope she does not fall in love with him. I had that problem before with a honeytrap,” he added.
Roussev went on: “You need strong, assertive and independence-driven girls. Vanya is very, very assertive and strongly independent… [a] true sexy bitch.”
Prosecutor Alison Morgan KC told jurors that Gaberova had been engaged in capturing surveillance photos of Mr Grozev at the conference.
“Roussev would later seek to use face recognition software to check that the image did show Christo Grozev with Higgins together,” she said.
Jurors have heard that Roussev, 46, of Great Yarmouth, Norfolk, and another defendant, Biser Dzhambazov, 43, of Harrow, north-west London, have pleaded guilty to conspiring to spy for Russia.
Bulgarian national Gabverova, Katrin Ivanova, 33, and Tihomir Ivanov Ivanchev, 39, are on trial at the Old Bailey for allegedly being part of the same UK-based spy network.
The trial was adjourned until tomorrow morning.
The US is preparing to send an extra $725m in military assistance to Ukraine, two American officials have said.
Counter-drone systems and munitions for its High Mobility Artillery Rocket System are included in the package, which could indicate more of the longer-range missiles are headed to the battlefield.
Two US officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to Reuters to discuss the package before it was announced, did not confirm whether the munitions for the HIMARS are the coveted ATACMS – the Army Tactical Missile System.
The package also includes more of the anti-personnel land mines that Ukraine is counting on to slow Russian and North Korean ground forces in Russia’s Kursk region.
Be the first to get Breaking News
Install the Sky News app for free