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Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Monday said Donald Trump showed a “clear stance and expressed determination” after the US president said he would cut the 50-day deadline he set for Russia to negotiate peace in Ukraine. Trump on Monday set a new but still imprecise deadline of “10 or 12 days from today” for Russia to make progress towards peace or face consequences. Trump’s previous deadlines to end the war have included “one day … 24 hours” and “about two weeks … within two weeks” as well as “50 days”.
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Two weeks had already passed since Trump threatened to act within 50 days, leaving 36 days remaining of the original deadline. The new ultimatum of “10 or 12 days” means the US president has given Putin about 25 fewer days to deliberate. Trump has threatened sanctions on both Russia and buyers of its exports unless progress is made.
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On Monday, Trump indicated he was not interested in talking directly to Putin. “If you know what the answer is going to be, why wait? And it would be sanctions and maybe tariffs, secondary tariffs,” Trump said. “I don’t want to do that to Russia. I love the Russian people.” Zelenskyy said: “I thank President Trump for his focus on saving lives and stopping this horrible war … Russia pays attention to sanctions, pays attention to such losses.”
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The Russian airline Aeroflot was forced to cancel dozens of flights on Monday after an established pro-Ukraine hacking group said it had carried out a cyber-attack. Dan Milmo reports how departure boards at Moscow’s Sheremetyevo airport turned red as flights were cancelled at a time when many Russians take their holidays. Irate passengers vented their anger on social media. One wrote: “I’ve been sitting at the Volgograd airport since 3:30! The flight has been rescheduled for the third time!” Another posted: “The call centre is unavailable, the website is unavailable, the app is unavailable.”
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A statement purporting to be from a hacking group called Silent Crow said it had carried out the operation with a Belarusian group called Cyber Partisans, and linked it to the war in Ukraine. “Glory to Ukraine! Long live Belarus!” said the statement. Silent Crow said the cyber-attack was the result of a year-long operation that had deeply penetrated Aeroflot’s network, destroyed 7,000 servers and gained control over the personal computers of employers including senior managers. It did not provide evidence. It threatened to shortly start releasing “the personal data of all Russians who have ever flown Aeroflot”.
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Pjotr Sauer meanwhile reports how tens of thousands of passengers have seen their travel plans thrown into chaos in recent weeks, as Ukrainian drones repeatedly disrupt Russian airspace. The systematic Ukrainian campaigns aims to bring the war home to ordinary Russians, many of whom have otherwise experienced it only from their television screens. Pjotr Sauer writes that Ukrainian civilians live under the constant threat of being killed by missiles and drones, and Ukrainian officials have emphasised that life in Russia should not be comfortable for “a population that, by and large, continues to support the war. The tactic seems to be bearing fruit: regular airport shutdowns and missed holidays have become a major talking point among the Russian public and a growing source of frustration.”
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Blackouts took place in parts of Russian-occupied Donetsk during a mass attack by Ukrainian drones on Monday, according to reports. The electricity distributor Donetskenergo said three substations were hit, leaving about 160,000 customers without power. The independent Russian-run Astra Telegram channel said the Donbas Palace Hotel in Donetsk city was also hit.
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Ukraine’s Sumy region came under Russian attack on Monday into Tuesday evening, local officials reported. A man, 45, was injured by a drone while taking a cow out to pasture in the Krasnopil community, said Oleg Grigorov, head of the Sumy regional administration. A man, 66, was injured when his apartment was shelled. “At around 5.45pm, the Russians attacked the Burynska community with four attack UAVs. The strike destroyed a local store,” Grigorov said. “One of the saleswomen was injured – she was promptly provided with medical assistance and her life is not in danger. Damage was also recorded to residential buildings, a cultural centre, non-residential premises and cars.”
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The US-German defence company Auterion will provide 33,000 artificial intelligence guidance kits for Ukrainian drones funded by a $50m Pentagon contract. According to the company, the kits enable manually piloted strike drones to autonomously track and hit targets up to a kilometre away – one way of circumventing electronic jamming that can cut a drone off from its operator. “We have previously shipped thousands of our AI strike systems to Ukraine, but this new deployment increases our support more than tenfold,” said the CEO of Auterion, Lorenz Meier.
