Category: EU News

Kelin described the conflict as “a proxy war led by the United Kingdom’s government” which by providing weapons is “killing Russian soldiers and civilians”….reports Asian Lite News

Moscow’s ambassador to London has said the UK is waging a proxy war against Russia, while predicting the “end of Ukraine” as Russian invading forces make deeper advances into the country.

In an interview with the BBC, Andrei Kelin said Ukraine continued to fight but claimed “the resistance is more feeble and feeble”.

Russian troops, he said, were gaining more terrain every day, adding: “The end of this phase will mean the end of Ukraine.” Russia is thought to control about 18% of Ukraine and has been making slow but steady advances over the last year.

Kelin also described the conflict as “a proxy war led by the United Kingdom’s government” which by providing weapons is “killing Russian soldiers and civilians”.

The comments came as Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, renewed his appeal to western countries for air-defence systems, after Russian missile strikes on the central city of Kryvyi Rih late on Saturday wounded 17 people, according to Ukrainian officials.

Ukraine is losing its territory in its eastern Donbas region to Russia’s invading forces, while coming under sustained bombardment, but has yet to convince western allies to provide it with long-range missiles to strike Russian military targets.

In Kryvyi Rih, Zelenskyy’s home town, a police officer and rescue worker were among those injured in Russian attacks that damaged sites including an administrative building, a hotel and an educational facility, Ukraine’s national police reported on social media.

The regional governor, Serhiy Lysak, said later that 15 apartment buildings, stores, a cafe, a church, office spaces, a bank branch and a gas pipeline had been damaged in the city.

In a social media post on Sunday, Zelenskyy said that in the last week Russia had used more than 20 missiles of different types, about 800 guided aerial bombs, more than 500 varying strike drones against Ukraine. “Ukraine needs more air defence systems and long-range capabilities. I am grateful to all partners who understand this and support us,” he wrote on X.

His post was accompanied with a 47-second video showing numerous smashed-up cars, burning buildings and bombed out homes in seven Ukrainian regions, described as the result of a week of Russian attacks.

Meanwhile, the Russian defence ministry said that 110 drones were destroyed in an overnight barrage against seven Russian regions. Many targeted Russia’s border region of Kursk, where 43 drones were reportedly shot down, but others appeared to go much further

Gleb Nikitin, the governor of Nizhny Novgorod, a city 250 miles (250km) east of Moscow, wrote on Telegram that four fighters had been lightly injured repelling a drone attack over an industrial zone, and were later discharged. He did not go into further details.

In Kyiv, officials reported that about 10 drones were destroyed near the capital, with no known destruction or injuries.

Visiting Kyiv on Saturday, France’s foreign minister, Jean-Noël Barrot, pledged support for Ukraine’s plan for ending the war with Russia, telling reporters he would work to secure other nations’ backing for the proposals.

Outlining his “victory plan” this week, Zelenskyy called for an “immediate” invitation to join Nato to guarantee Ukraine’s security, but western allies have given a guarded response. Moscow claimed the plan amounted to an escalation, by “pushing Nato into direct conflict” with Russia.

Russia’s ambassador to the UK was speaking to the BBC after the opening of a public inquiry into the death of Dawn Sturgess. She died in 2018 after coming into contact with the nerve agent novichok, believed to have been in a perfume bottle discarded by Russian agents who had tried to assassinate the former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia in Salisbury a few months earlier.

The inquest into Sturgess’s death was converted into a public inquiry in 2021 and opened last Monday.

The UK government told the inquiry this week in a statement that it considered the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, had authorised the Salisbury novichok poisonings, which could have killed thousands of people.

The Russian government has denied any involved in the attempted assassination of the Skripals and poisoning of Sturgess and her partner, Charlie Rowley, who survived.

Asked in the BBC interview if he had any words for Sturgess’s grieving family, the ambassador said: “I don’t know. I have never met this family. I am not involved in discussions with them or anything else. If someone has died of course we are concerned about that.”

He also questioned the need for an inquiry: “Why drag this history so long?”

The Skripal poisonings are seen as a turning point in British perceptions of Russia, triggering what the then prime minister, Theresa May, described as “the largest collective expulsion of Russian intelligence officers in history”.

More than 100 Russian diplomats working in 20 western countries, who were alleged to be spies, were told to return to Moscow in a show of solidarity by western allies.

ALSO READ: Tackling misogyny vital, says London mayor

Both sides agreed to hold a summit to “oversee the development” of the new relationship in early 2025…reports Asian Lite News

The United Kingdom and the European Union have jointly vowed to take forward their “agenda of strengthened cooperation at pace”, with a leader-level summit on the reset in relations expected to take place early next year.

In a joint statement, the President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, and British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said they would start the work of defining “the areas in which strengthened cooperation would be mutually beneficial,” listing the economy, energy, security and resilience as priority areas.

Despite the warmer tones, Starmer refused to be drawn on how he saw EU-UK relations strengthening in the future; insisting the two sides were still in the early days of the reset.

However, he stressed the UK government’s intention to improve relations in order to achieve practical “deliverables”.

This visit was about charting a “return to pragmatism and to doing business in a respectful way and in a way which I think will focus on deliverables”, he told reporters after the meeting.

He agreed talks going forward might be challenging but said that rebuilding relations with Brussels rather than “charging to the nearest camera or megaphone” was the better option.

“Look, of course, there’ll be challenges along the way, but this was about a good faith step forward to constructive deliverables, which I think are achievable,” he told journalists.

‘Move beyond Brexit’

Wednesday’s meeting was Starmer’s first formal bilateral one-on-one with von der Leyen since his election last July. He also met the outgoing president of the European Council, Charles Michel, and the president of the European Parliament, Roberta Metsola.

The move is of major symbolic importance in efforts to restore the relationship between both sides, eight years after the UK voted to leave the bloc and four years since it formally exited its political and economic structures.

Starmer’s Labour-led government has set out to change the tone of UK-EU relations after 14 years of successive Conservative governments in London, during which the relationship plunged to a historic low.

With war raging on Europe’s doorstep in Ukraine and in the Middle East, closer cooperation on security and defence that could span broad areas including critical raw materials, energy and migration, is said to be under consideration.

Since he entered government in July, Starmer has also vowed to smooth out barriers to trade with the EU, after the UK’s post-Brexit exit from the EU single market delivered a heavy blow to UK-based traders and businesses.

Speaking ahead of the meeting, von der Leyen said: “Our alignment on global affairs provides a good foundation for our bilateral relations and we have a set of solid agreements in place.”

“We should explore the scope for more cooperation while we focus on the full and faithful implementation of the withdrawal agreement, the Windsor Framework and the TCA,” von der Leyen added, signalling the EU executive will want the UK to comply with all its post-Brexit obligations before it can improve its post-Brexit trading conditions with the European bloc.

Ahead of the talks, the UK government said in a statement it wanted to “move beyond Brexit” with improved cooperation with the European bloc.

“I firmly believe that the British public want to return to pragmatic, sensible leadership when it comes to dealing with our closest neighbours,” Starmer told reporters.

“To make Brexit work and to deliver in their interests, to find ways to boost economic growth, strengthen our security and tackle shared challenges like irregular migration and climate change,” he added.

But Starmer has also defined clear red lines, ruling out any return to the EU’s single market, customs union or freedom of movement as part of the re-negotiated relationship. A stance he reiterated in his post-meeting press conference

“There will be no return to freedom of movement, no return to the Customs Union, no return to the single market, but we will find constructive ways to work together and deliver for the British people,” he said.

No ‘cherry-picking’

While there is appetite in Brussels to engage, especially on common efforts to tackle irregular migration and boost cooperation on security, the EU is unlikely to give in to Starmer’s demands without drawing concessions.

In April, the EU executive tabled a proposal for a youth mobility agreement, which would restore young Brits and Europeans’ ability to freely travel, work and study on both sides.

But the deal would likely be unpalatable to large swathes of the UK’s pro-Brexit electorate, meaning Starmer has repeatedly ruled it out both during and after his electoral campaign. His home secretary Yvette Cooper said in an interview last week that the EU sees the deal “in the context of free movement,” doubling down on the UK’s refusal to allow freedom of movement across its borders.

Analysts say that both London and Brussels may need to strike a compromise deal on youth mobility to be able to reach more mutually beneficial agreement on critical issues such as trade and security.

“I think there is a recognition within the (Labour) party that it is going to have to agree to some kind of youth mobility agreement,” Joel Reland of UK in a Changing Europe said.

“Similarly, the EU has hinted that it may be willing to compromise on the initial deal it proposed – for instance by reducing the length of time that young people can travel for, or removing the demand that EU students pay the same tuition fees as UK students,” Ireland added, suggesting there is a “landing zone” where both sides could subscribe to the mobility deal.

ALSO READ: Doval, French FM discuss Europe, West Asia wars 

ALSO READ: European films screening at VOX opens in Mall of Oman