U.S. President Donald Trump's special envoys, Steve Witkoff and Keith Kellogg, will travel to Istanbul for possible peace talks between Ukraine and Russia, Reuters reported on May 13, citing three undisclosed sources.
President Volodymyr Zelensky said he will meet with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in Ankara, but said both leaders are ready to fly to Istanbul if Russian President Vladimir Putin chooses to attend the talks there.
A captive named Umit allegedly agreed to serve in the Russian army in exchange for Russian citizenship and a monetary reward of 2 million rubles ($25,000).
Russia's Buryatia Republic declared a state of emergency on May 13 over massive forest fires that have engulfed multiple regions in the Russian Far East.
Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Grushko's statement came as Strong Shield 5 exercises involving military personnel from other NATO countries began in Lithuania.
"Amendments to the Budget Code are needed to implement the provisions on funding the U.S.-Ukrainian Reconstruction Investment Fund," lawmaker Roksolana Pidlasa said.
During reconnaissance in an unspecified front-line sector, Special Operations Forces' operators detected Buk-M3 and Uragan-1 on combat duty, the unit said.
The suspect quit his job at the Rivne NPP before the full-scale war began. In the spring of 2025, a GRU liaison contacted him and offered cooperation in exchange for money.
U.K. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak (L) attends a bilateral meeting with U.S. President Joe Biden in the Oval Office at the White House on June 8, 2023 in Washington, DC. Sunak is on his first visit to the United States since taking office and the two leaders are discussing the Russia-Ukraine war and strengthening their economic partnership. (Photo by Niall Carson - Pool/Getty Images)
U.S. President Joe Biden and U.K. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak met at the White House on June 8 to discuss a variety of issues, with particular focus on the recent humanitarian disaster in southern Ukraine following Russia's destruction of the Kakhokva dam.
Biden and Sunak also pledged to maintain financial and military support for Ukraine.
"The fact of the matter is that I believe we’ll have the funding necessary to support Ukraine as long as it takes," Biden said. "I asked people to picture what would happen if we were not supporting Ukraine. Do we think Russia would stop in Kyiv?"
Biden added that the "vast majority" of his critics would agree that curbing Russian influence is necessary enough to warrant funding agreements.
Sunak echoed a similar stance, saying that continued support from the U.K. for Ukraine should send "a strong signal to (Russian dictator Vladimir Putin) that there is no point in trying to wait us out."
He added that the U.K. will support Ukraine "for as long as it takes," for Putin to withdraw Russian forces from Ukraine.
Both leaders underscored the importance of a U.S-U.K. alliance on supporting Ukraine amidst a broader need to ensure European security.
Haley Zehrung is a news editor at the Kyiv Independent. Previously, she was a Title VIII Fellow at the Department of State, where she conducted archival research in Kyrgyzstan. She has also worked at C4ADS, the Middle East Institute, and Barnard College. Haley completed a Bachelor of Arts and a Master of Arts at Columbia University in Political Science and Eurasian Studies.
Lili Bivings
