Key events
My colleague, Lili Bayer is blogging all the developments from Brussels today on a key summit of EU leaders who are meeting in a bid to unblock Hungarian leader Viktor Orbán’s veto on Ukraine aid. She writes that diplomats expect a deal today:
Senior diplomats who spoke with the Guardian this morning were optimistic that a compromise could be reached on a funding package for Ukraine.
One senior diplomat said:
The mood is both of determination and frustration. The deal will be there in any event, just the question is how much Orbán wants to deepen his self-isolation.
Asked if Orbán would agree to a deal, a second senior diplomat said:
I think he will.
Petteri Orpo, the Finnish prime minister, said “we have [a] very important day today.”
We have very good solution from December between 26 member states. Today, best result would be the solution between 27. If it is not possible, we have to be ready to finalise the decision to help Ukraine and finalise our budget between 26 member states.
He added:
I want to say that we are ready to negotiate, but our values are not [for] sale – and we have to understand that the situation in Ukraine is so difficult, it is crucial to find a solution. And for me it’s unacceptable that one country can block such an important decision.
The Finnish leader stressed: “No one can blackmail 26 EU countries.”
A North Korean delegation will visit the lower house of Russia’s parliament on 13 February, state news agency RIA quoted a deputy from the opposition Communist party as saying on Thursday.
According to Reuters, lawmaker Kazbek Taysaev also said that a Russian parliamentary delegation planned to travel to North Korea in March.
Russia has stepped up ties with North Korea and other countries hostile to the US such as Iran since the start of the war with Ukraine – relations that are a source of concern to the west.
Russian president Vladimir Putin last year accepted Kim Jong-un’s invitation to visit North Korea, though the date of the trip is still unclear. The Kremlin said last month that a Putin visit would take place in the foreseeable future.
The US has accused North Korea of supplying Russia with artillery shells and missiles used in the Ukraine war. Both Moscow and Pyongyang have denied the US accusations, but vowed last year to deepen military relations.
EU leaders have returned to Brussels for a second showdown in two months with Hungary’s Viktor Orbán over his refusal to sanction a new €50bn assistance package for Ukraine. Lisa O’Carroll reports from Brussels, and Lili Bayer will blog all the developments:
A mixture of frustration and anger prevailed in the city as leaders arrived for dinner on Wednesday night on the eve of the emergency summit, with aides lamenting the failure of the Hungarian PM to shift position since December, when he first blocked the funds. “We are really at a crossroads,” said one EU official.
Diplomats in Brussels stress that Ukraine will not run out of funding for military equipment and ammunition as this comes through individual member states through the European Peace Facility. But they are worried about liquidity in the Ukrainian economy and the signal a lack of unity will give to Putin.
Efforts to persuade Orbán to budge have redoubled in the past 24 hours, with representatives of the other 26 EU states agreeing to insert a compromise paragraph in the draft text of the agreement being sought at the summit on the budget.
Read the full report here
Welcome to the Guardian’s live coverage of the war in Ukraine for Thursday 1 February 2023. Here are the top lines:
Ukraine has reportedly carried out heavy missile strikes on military targets in Crimea including the Balbek airfield used by occupying Russian forces, with possible losses of Russian aircraft and personnel. Ukrainian news outlets citing military sources said Scalp and Storm Shadow missiles were used in the attacks on Wednesday.
Ukraine’s air force commander, General Mykola Oleshchuk, acknowledged the Balbek attack, sharing online a video of an explosion and calling it a “cleansing of Crimea from the Russian presence”. A Russian military radar was hit earlier in apparent preparation for the Crimea attacks.
US legislation for more aid to Ukraine will probably be split from a $110bn “national security” package that also covers US-Mexico border security, the Republican speaker of the US House of Representatives, Mike Johnson, has told visiting speakers from the Baltic countries, Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia.
The US president, Joe Biden, has continued to use presidential powers to work around the Republican blockade. His secretary of state, Antony Blinken, has notified the Greek government that the US will transfer to Greece’s military surplus equipment including C-130 planes; 60 Bradley armoured fighting vehicles which are prized by the Ukrainians; ships; trucks; and other equipment. There is an agreement that Greece will make an equivalent transfer of equipment to Ukraine, according to Greek media reports.
A Russian bomb struck a hospital in Velykyi Burluk, north-east of Kharkiv, on Wednesday, smashing windows and equipment and prompting the evacuation of dozens of patients, regional officials said.
Russia and Ukraine have conducted a major prisoner of war exchange, one week after a previous swap was shelved when a Russian Il-76 transport plane was shot down. Russia and Ukraine both said that about 200 prisoners were exchanged on Wednesday, although their exact figures differed. Russia has produced no proof for its claim that the plane shot down last week contained Ukrainian PoW.
The EU expects to reach 52% of its target to send 1m rounds of shells to Ukraine by March this year and plans to train another 20,000 soldiers, said the EU’s top diplomat, Josep Borrell.
Olaf Scholz and four other European leaders admitted that the EU had “fallen short” of its goals to supply Ukraine with artillery ammunition on the eve of an emergency EU summit of EU leaders designed to break the deadlock between member states and Hungary’s Putin-allied Viktor Orbán over a €50bn aid package.
The international court of justice (ICJ) has found Russia violated some parts of a UN anti-terrorism treaty by not investigating financial support for separatist groups in eastern Ukraine in 2014. The top UN court declined to rule specifically on alleged Russian responsibility for shooting down Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 over eastern Ukraine on 17 July 2014. The ICJ ruled that Russia violated the UN anti-discrimination treaty by failing to protect education in the Ukrainian language in Crimea.
The Russian president, Vladimir Putin, said Russian troops were holding ground on the outskirts of the east Ukrainian industrial town of Avdiivka. Russian troops have failed to take the town in repeated and extremely bloody attempts that have cost Russia thousands of casualties and hundreds of tanks and armoured vehicles.
Ukraine claimed to have carried out another drone attack on an oil facility deep inside Russian territory, according to a military intelligence source.
Russia’s defence minister, Sergei Shoigu, told military manufacturers to “stop fooling around” and further increase the production of self-propelled artillery systems during a visit to arms-producing factories in the Urals.
Putin will visit Nato member Turkey to meet its president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, on 12 February, a Turkish official has said. Because of an international criminal court (ICC) warrant for war crimes, Putin can’t travel to many places abroad, but Turkey does not recognise the ICC.