Brazilian President Lula da Silva claimed that Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha had appealed to his Brazilian counterpart, Mauro Vieira, to ask Putin if he was willing to conclude a peace agreement.
Earlier reporting from the Washington Post cited a former Russian official who claimed Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and Putin’s foreign policy aide, Yuri Ushakov, would represent Moscow in the talks.
The Council of Europe on May 14 approved the creation of a special tribunal to prosecute Russia's top leadership for the crime of aggression against Ukraine, Ukrainian lawmaker Maria Mezentseva reported.
Viktoria Roshchyna, 27, disappeared in August 2023 while reporting from Ukraine's Russian-occupied territories. Moscow admitted she was in Russian detention the following year.
Dutch Justice Minister David van Weel speaks about the future of the EU-led special tribunal for the crime of aggression against Ukraine and its role in bringing Russia to justice.
Turkish officials told Bloomberg that while they don't expect Trump to visit Istanbul, they are not ruling it out, and preparations for any scenario are underway.
Melkonyants was arrested in August 2023 in connection with the activities of the European Network of Election Monitoring Organizations (ENEMO), which was co-founded by Golos's legal predecessor, the Golos association.
Ukraine's underground storage facilities are currently using 19.4% of their capacity. Almost 32%, or 2.79 bcm, less gas is available in the storages than in the previous year, according to the estimates.
The majority of Ukrainians, 71%, do not support holding elections before a full peace deal, even in the case of a ceasefire and security guarantees, according to a poll published by the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology (KIIS) on May 14.
"He'd like me to be there, and that's a possibility. ... I don't know that he would be there if I'm not there. We're going to find out," U.S. President Donald Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One while traveling to Qatar, Reuters reported.
Trump has long demanded that NATO allies increase their military spending, previously calling for the alliance to raise its benchmark from 2% to 5% of GDP.
Grigory Melkonyants, the co-chair of the independent Russian election monitoring group Golos, accused of cooperation with an "undesirable" organisation, reacts inside the glass defendants' box during the verdict announcement at the Basmanny district court in Moscow on May 14, 2025. (STRINGER/AFP via Getty Images)
A Moscow court on May 14 sentenced Grigory Melkonyants, the co-chair of independent Russian election monitor Golos, to five years in prison over allegedly participating in activities of an "undesirable" organization.
Melkonyants was arrested in August 2023 in connection with Golos's claimed links to the European Network of Election Monitoring Organizations (ENEMO), a Montenegro-based international network of election monitors working in Europe and Central Asia.
Russia branded ENEMO as an "undesirable" organization – a legal classification used to repress the regime's perceived opponents – in September 2021.
Prosecutors have called for a six-year sentence and claimed that Golos was a structural part of ENEMO, which Melkonyants and the network both denied. The Montenegro-based network has said it has not interacted with Golos since 2021.
Independent news outlet Mediazona noted that neither the Golos association – the original iteration of the organization dissolved after being branded a "foreign agent" – not the current Golos movement has been named an "undesirable" organization.
Melkonyants was also banned from public activities for nine years after serving his sentence. The prison term will count since the start of his pretrial detention in 2023.
The case has been largely described as part of the Kremlin's crackdown on civil society.
Golos, in its various forms, has monitored Russian elections since 2000. It has faced hostility from the Kremlin for highlighting widespread electoral violations — most notably during the 2012 presidential election, which marked Vladimir Putin’s return to power.
The crackdown against the organization has only intensified after the outbreak of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, as Golos's members have openly criticized the war.
Martin Fornusek is a news editor at the Kyiv Independent. He has previously worked as a news content editor at the media company Newsmatics and is a contributor to Euromaidan Press. He was also volunteering as an editor and translator at the Czech-language version of Ukraïner. Martin studied at Masaryk University in Brno, Czechia, holding a bachelor's degree in security studies and history and a master's degree in conflict and democracy studies.
Chris York
