U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer, French President Emmanuel Macron, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, and Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk will arrive in Kyiv early on May 10.
The United States embassy in Kyiv on May 9 issued a warning that Russia could launch "a potentially significant" attack in the coming days, despite Putin's self-declared Victory Day "truce."
The sanctioned oil tankers have transported over $24 billion in cargo since 2024, according to Downing Street. The U.K. has now sanctioned more shadow fleet vessels than any other country.
Washington and its partners are considering additional sanctions if the parties do not observe a ceasefire, with political and technical negotiations between Europe and the U.S. intensifying since last week, Reuters' source said.
The Kyiv Independent’s contributor Ignatius Ivlev-Yorke spent a day with a mobile team from the State Emergency Service in Nikopol in the south of Ukraine as they responded to relentless drone, artillery, and mortar strikes from Russian forces just across the Dnipro River. Nikopol is located across from the Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant in the city of Enerhodar.
Peter Szijjarto's announcement came after Ukraine's Security Service (SBU) allegedly dismantled a Hungarian military intelligence network operating in Zakarpattia Oblast.
U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio (L) and US National Security Advisor Mike Waltz (R) speak with the media following meetings with a Ukrainian delegation in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia on March 11, 2025. (Saul Loeb/POOL/AFP via Getty Images)
U.S. National Security Adviser Mike Waltz sat down with CBS News on March 23 to discuss the upcoming U.S.-led negotiations in Saudi Arabia on ending the war between Russia and Ukraine.
When asked about the goals of the peace talks in Saudi Arabia, Waltz praised the efforts of the Trump administration, noting that there are "technical teams actually with Ukrainians and Russians in the same facility, conducting proximity talks."
Waltz said that the topics of prisoner exchanges and Ukrainian children illegally abducted by Russia will likely be discussed at the peace talks, adding that they will serve as a "confidence building measures" for negotiations.
"President Trump has spoken to both leaders about prisoner exchanges. Both the Russians and Ukrainians exchanged prisoners, nearly 200, immediately following their call. And he's also talked about the future of these children. So that's certainly, first and foremost, and, kind of, confidence building measures," Waltz said.
When asked to clarify whether the Trump team will request "the release of these children as a confidence building measure," Waltz confirmed that the measure is "one of them."
At least 19,500 Ukrainian children have been confirmed as abducted by Russia since the start of its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, and about 1,200 have been brought home, according to the Ukrainian government's Children of War database.
Waltz also mentioned the recent 30-day ceasefire on energy infrastructure and a pending ceasefire in the Black Sea, that would allow "both sides [to] move grain, fuel, and start conducting trade again."
Russia has repeatedly targeted Black Sea shipping routes since the start of the full-scale invasion. In July 2023, they also pulled out of the Black Sea Grain Initiative, further threatening global food security.
The International Criminal Court (ICC) issued an arrest warrant for Russian Presidential Commissioner for Children's Rights Maria Lvova-Belova and Russian President Vladimir Putin on March 17, 2023, over the deportation of Ukrainian children.
Natalia Yermak
