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.
The International Court of Justice (ICJ) begins to read the decision on the objections raised by Russia regarding the 'jurisdiction' and 'admissibility' conditions of the 'genocide' case brought by Ukraine against Russia in The Hague, Netherlands on Feb. 2, 2024. (Nikos Oikonomou/Anadolu via Getty Images)
The United Nations' International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruled that it will hear a part of Ukraine's lawsuit against Russia over false allegations of genocide that Moscow used to justify its full-scale invasion, Reuters reported on Feb. 2.
Ukraine brought a case before the ICJ in February 2022, arguing that Russia violated international law when it used false claims about acts of genocide against Russian speakers in Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts as a justification to launch an all-out war against Ukraine.
Judges declared that the ICJ had jurisdiction to hear only a small part of the original case, according to Reuters.
The Hague-based court will rule on whether Ukraine committed genocide in the parts of eastern Ukraine now occupied by Russia but has rejected Kyiv's request to determine whether Moscow's invasion violated the 1948 Genocide Convention.
Russia submitted objections to Ukraine's suit during hearings in September, arguing that the UN's principal judicial organ does not have the jurisdiction to hear the case. Following the Feb. 2 decision, the suit can advance, but it may take months before hearings resume on the case's merits.
Ukraine's case is supported by 32 intervening states, which is reportedly the largest number of countries to ever join another nation's lawsuit at the Hague court.
In its lawsuit, Ukraine "emphatically denies" that such genocide has occurred, aiming "to establish that Russia has no lawful basis to take action in and against Ukraine for the purpose of preventing and punishing any purported genocide."
Kyiv's lawyers also accused Moscow of "planning acts of genocide in Ukraine," adding that Russia "is intentionally killing and inflicting serious injury on members of the Ukrainian nationality."
Since the outbreak of Russia's full-scale war, the NATO Parliamentary Assembly and the parliaments of eight countries, including Ukraine, have recognized acts committed by Russian invading forces as genocide.
The Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) called on European countries to recognize Russia's mass abduction of Ukrainian children as genocide and on the international community to help Ukraine retrieve the children.
Paul Grod
