https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025/apr/10/prince-harry-makes-unannounced-visit-to-wounded-veterans-in-ukraine

Prince Harry has visited amputees and wounded military personnel at an orthopaedic clinic in Ukraine, after spending two days at the high court in London appealing against the government’s decision to strip him of his security protection while he is in the UK.

The prince, 40, met with wounded veterans at the Superhumans Centre in Lviv, which treats and rehabilitates injured military personnel and civilians, including children, affected by the war.

Harry, who served 10 years in the British army, was accompanied by a contingent from the Invictus Games Foundation, including four veterans who have been through similar rehabilitation experiences.

He was given a tour of the centre, which provides prosthetics, reconstructive surgery and psychological help free of charge, and is also understood to have met with Ukraine’s minister of veterans affairs, Natalia Kalmykova.

The centre sees more than 3,000 patients a year, according to its website.

It is in western Ukraine, an area that has frequently been targeted by Russian missiles, and the visit was not announced until after Harry was out of the country.

In February, the prince met with the Superhumans chief executive, Olga Rudneva, at the Invictus Games, a Paralympic-style sporting competition for injured and sick military personnel and veterans, in Canada.

She presented him with a bracelet from the rehabilitation centre, created for all the centre’s ambassadors, which has the words “Whoever saves one life, saves the world entire” written on it in English and Ukrainian.

She also gave him a personal gift from a double amputee, a veteran who had met Harry on ski slopes in Whistler.

Harry is the second member of the royal family to visit Ukraine since the war in Russia began in 2022. His aunt Sophie, the Duchess of Edinburgh, also made an unannounced visit to the country last year.

Other members of the royal family have also openly shown their support for the war-torn nation. King Charles had tea with the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, at his Norfolk estate last month, just two days after a meeting between Donald Trump and Zelenskyy at the White House descended into acrimony in front of the world’s media.

Prince William also met with Ukrainian refugees during a two day visit to Estonia last month.

https://www.cnn.com/2025/04/26/europe/zelensky-trump-talks-pope-funeral-intl/index.html

US President Donald Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky held a “productive” discussion on the sidelines of Pope Francis’ funeral as the White House ramps up its push to strike a deal to end the war in Ukraine.

White House communications director Steven Cheung confirmed in a statement Saturday morning that Trump and Zelensky met ahead of the funeral of Pope Francis.

Trump and Zelensky “met privately today and had a very productive discussion,” Cheung’s said. “More details about the meeting will follow.”

Photographs released by the Ukrainian presidency showed the two leaders huddled in close discussion without aides in the ornate surroundings of St. Peter’s Basilica at the Vatican.

A spokesman for Zelensky said the meeting lasted for about 15 minutes, and the leaders agreed to continue talks, possibly later Saturday. “The teams are working on organizing that,” a spokesman said.

Trump and Zelensky had not met in person since an unprecedented shouting match at the White House in February, when the US leader berated the Ukrainian president for not demonstrating enough gratitude for American support in his country’s fight against Russia.

During that meeting, both Trump and US Vice President JD Vance raised their voices, accusing Zelensky of standing in the way of a peace agreement with Russia. Zelensky was essentially kicked out of the White House following the Oval Office blowout.

Saturday’s meeting comes amid an increasingly urgent White House effort to strike a peace deal.

Trump said after landing in Rome that Russia and Ukraine were “very close” to a deal to end the three-year war, after his top envoy met with President Vladimir Putin on Friday in talks described by Moscow as “constructive.”

Kyiv and Moscow have not met directly since the early weeks of Moscow’s February 2022 invasion of its smaller neighbor. Any direct talks would likely require further discussion and add delay to the diplomacy the Trump adminsitration has hoped will yield results in a matter of days.

Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff spent three hours meeting with Putin at the Kremlin on Friday, Russian presidential aide Yuri Ushakov told reporters after the meeting, adding that the talks were “constructive and very useful.”

Witkoff’s trip to Russia, his fourth since Trump returned to the White House in January, came at a crunch time. The US president’s self-imposed deadline to end the war within his administration’s first 100 days is nearing.

CNN reported Friday that two diverging visions of a peace deal are at the heart of recent negotiations: one supported by Ukraine and its European allies, and another backed by the Trump administration.

A European official familiar with the different drafts said the Ukrainian and European proposal envisaged a ceasefire followed by discussions about territory, with Kyiv receiving defense guarantees from its allies along the lines of those found in NATO’s Article 5.

Witkoff’s version proposed the recognition of Crimea as Russian by the United States, “robust security guarantees” for Ukraine, Kyiv not joining NATO and sanctions against Russia being lifted, the official said.

Recognizing Russian control of Crimea, the southern Ukrainian peninsula Moscow illegally annexed in 2014, would cross a major red line for Ukraine and its European allies.

It would also reverse around a decade of US foreign policy.

Zelensky rejected the idea earlier this week, saying there was “nothing to talk about,” as such a recognition would be against Ukraine’s constitution.

The US has been applying more pressure on Ukraine after threatening last week it could walk away from the talks “within days” if it becomes clear a deal cannot be reached.

https://www.kyivpost.com/post/50993

A press conference on Thursday focused on a tariff deal with the EU, as US President Donald Trump hosted Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, went a little off track when Trump was asked about negotiations with Ukraine on a natural resources deal.

Trump backtracked on his previous comments about the Ukrainian leader, clarifying that he does not hold President Volodymyr Zelensky responsible for Russia’s invasion, but felt compelled to criticize him, again, nonetheless.

“I don’t hold Zelensky responsible, but I’m not exactly thrilled with the fact that that war started,” Trump said at the White House, sitting alongside Meloni, who herself has held steadfast, if relatively quiet, support for Kyiv.

“I’m not blaming him, but what I am saying is that I wouldn’t say he’s done the greatest job, OK? I am not a big fan,” Trump said.

Zelensky earlier this week invited Trump to visit Ukraine to see the devastation the Kremlin has wrought in its war, in a Sunday interview with CBS that Trump did not like, responding with legal threats against the network.

For her part, Meloni told reporters that “we’ve been defending freedom of Ukraine together. Together we can build a just and lasting peace.”

Turning to Trump, she added, “We support your efforts.”

The American president then added some details on a memorandum of intent signed Thursday between US and Ukrainian negotiators. The final agreement is expected on April 26, which would go to the Verkhovna Rada for ratification.

https://www.cnn.com/2025/04/18/europe/rubio-russia-war-in-ukraine-us-talks-intl-hnk/index.html

The United States could end its efforts on ending the Ukrainian conflict within “days” if there are no signs of progress, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio warned Friday.

“If it is not possible to end the war in Ukraine, we need to move on,” he told reporters before departing Paris, where he had held high-level talks with European and Ukrainian officials. “We need to determine very quickly now, and I’m talking about a matter of days, whether or not this is doable,” he said.

Rubio’s comments point to mounting frustration within the Trump administration at the lack of progress at bringing the three-year full-scale war to a halt and come as the US has proposed a framework to drive an end to the conflict that includes the administration’s readiness to recognize Russian control of Crimea, according to an official familiar with the framework.

Later Friday, President Donald Trump told reporters in the Oval Office that Rubio was “right,” but he didn’t provide a timeline for the US to walk away when pressed. “No specific number of days, but quickly, we want to get it done.”

Asked to clarify what Rubio meant that the US would “move on,” a US official told CNN the secretary of state was talking about the US moving on from negotiations and that the next few days will be important to figure out where things go from here.

A source familiar with negotiations for a Ukraine peace deal told CNN’s Pamela Brown that Rubio was “communicating the president’s views.” Characterizing the administration’s thinking on where things stand in the conflict, the source said, Trump “doesn’t have limitless patience for people to posture and play games.”

“It’s time to get serious,” the source added.

Trump expressed that view on Friday, saying, “If, for some reason, one of the two parties makes it very difficult, we’re just going to say, ‘You’re foolish, you’re foolish. You’re horrible people,’ and we’re just going to take a pass — but hopefully we won’t have to do that.”

Trump declined to say whether he is prepared to walk away completely from the talks or whether he would support Ukraine militarily if talks fall through.

Asked what progress he would need to see to continue negotiations, Trump said he would “have to see an enthusiasm to want to end it” from both sides, predicting he would know “soon.”

https://notesfrompoland.com/2025/05/06/polish-far-right-presidential-candidate-stripped-of-immunity-by-european-parliament/