In an interview with French broadcaster TF1 on May 13, Macron discussed new Russia sanctions and stationing French nuclear weapons in other European countries as a deterrent against Russia.
Performing their song "Bird of Pray," Ukrainian band Ziferblat passed the Eurovision semi-finals on May 13, qualifying Ukraine for the grand final on May 17.
Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov confirmed that a Russian delegation will be in Istanbul on May 15 for direct peace talks with Ukraine. Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and Putin’s foreign policy aide Yuri Ushakov will likely represent Russia.
The move follows Ukraine's ratification of the minerals agreement, deepening U.S.-Ukraine economic ties and signaling expanded U.S. involvement in Ukraine's long-term recovery.
"Ukraine has initiated a coordinated campaign to vilify Hungary in order to undermine our initiative to hold a poll on (Kyiv's) EU membership," Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban said.
German Chancellor Friedrich Merz warned that further concessions from Ukraine during negotiations would be unreasonable if Russia continues to attack civilian targets.
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.
Photo for illustrative purposes. A general view of the Crimean Bridge which connects Russian-occupied Crimea and Russia's Krasnodar region on July 25, 2023. (Stringer/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images)
Ukrainian forces struck a Russian radar station used in coordination with air defense systems near the village of Rozdolne in northwestern Crimea early on Jan. 30, the Ukrainian military reported.
As the full-scale war has developed, military facilities and infrastructure in Russian-occupied Crimea have become increasingly vulnerable to long-range Ukrainian drone and missile strikes.
Most spectacularly, separate Ukrainian strikes in September 2023, reportedly with British-made Storm Shadow missiles, destroyed a Russian landing ship, submarine, and the headquarters of the Russian Black Sea Fleet in Sevastopol.
The Ukrainian military didn’t specify which weapons were used to hit the radar system on Jan. 30.
Neither Moscow-installed occupation authorities in Crimea nor the Russian Defense Ministry reported on the attack near Rozdolne.
Yurii Ihnat, a spokesperson for Ukraine's Air Force, said on Jan. 20 that Russia’s air defense was thinning out, with a sufficient capacity on Ukraine's front lines and in occupied Crimea but not on Russian soil.
According to the U.K. Defense Ministry’s Nov. 2 intelligence update, Ukrainian strikes had destroyed at least four Russian surface-to-air missile (SAM) launchers located in occupied territories in one week.
Russia's high-tech, expensive SAM systems have reportedly suffered significant losses due to Ukraine's introduction of modern precision strike weapons onto the battlefield.
In order to compensate for the losses in Ukraine, Russia was probably forced to cycle out air defense systems from other locations, such as within Russia, which could have weakened its defenses there, the ministry wrote.
Dinara Khalilova
