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.
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.
President Volodymyr Zelensky would not meet any other Russian official apart from Russian President Vladimir Putin in Istanbul this week, presidential advisor Mykhailo Podolyak said on the Breakfast Show program on May 13.
A screenshot from the Russia 1 segment showing explicit photos of Melania Trump (X/Julia Davis)
The Kremlin-controlled state media channel Russia 1 ran explicit photos of Melania Trump during a segment last week in the wake of her husband's U.S. election victory.
The sequence, which highlighted several pictures from her modeling career, was shown during the prime-time show "60 Minutes," hosted by propagandists Olga Skabeeva and Yevgeny Popov.
"Here is how Melania looked in the year 2000. This is the cover of the magazine GQ," Popov says.
"In one of the shots, the model is only wearing her underwear, lying on a blue carpet with the United States seal, as though the editors of the men's magazine knew something in advance about the future of their model," he added with a smirk.
Beside him, Skabeeva can be seen visibly trying to suppress laughter.
Melania Trump, originally from Slovenia, was a professional model when they first met in 1998.
It's not immediately clear why the government-controlled TV and its prime-time news program chose this particular angle. Since Russian President Vladimir Putin suppressed freedom of speech in the country in the early 2000s and placed a tight grip on all mainstream TV networks, with little has been allowed to be aired in Russia without the government's permission.
Trump won the presidential vote on Nov. 6, defeating his Democratic opponent, Vice President Kamala Harris.
The election is expected to have a profound impact on Russia's war in Ukraine, as some worry Trump might seek to cut a deal with Russian President Vladimir Putin at the cost of painful concessions by Kyiv.
Putin congratulated Trump on his victory in the U.S. presidential election, saying he was ready "to have discussions" with Trump during the Valdai forum in Sochi on Nov. 7.
But earlier this week, the Kremlin denied that a widely reported phone conversation took place between the two during which Trump reportedly warned Putin "not to escalate" the war in Ukraine.
Boldizsar is a former Reuters correspondent for Hungary, currently based in Kharkiv, reporting for the Kyiv Independent and various other outlets. He holds degrees in political science, philosophy, and development policy.
Andrea Januta
