Closing summary
This blog is now closing. Below is a roundup of the latest stories:
Hungary is open to using the EU budget for a proposed €50bn ($54bn) aid package to Ukraine, the prime minister’s political director said. Balázs Orbán, the chief political aide to Viktor Orbán, confirmed that Budapest had sent a proposal to Brussels on Saturday showing it was open to using the budget for the aid package and issuing common EU debt to finance it if other “caveats” were added.
Representatives of the EU member states will meet on Monday evening to discuss funding for Ukraine as pressure mounts on Viktor Orbán to cave in and agree to a €50bn four-year package on the table.
Russia said on Monday its forces had taken control of the village of Tabaivka in Ukraine’s Kharkiv region, but Ukraine denied this. The Russian claim was made in a defence ministry statement. Volodymyr Fityo, the head of communications for Ukraine’s ground forces, said on national TV: “This does not correspond to reality. There are battles taking place near this locality.”
The Ukrainian foreign minister, Dmytro Kuleba, met his Hungarian counterpart, Péter Szijjártó, in western Ukraine on Monday ahead of an EU summit aimed at unlocking aid for the war-torn country.
Volodymyr Zelenskiy has spoken about the risk of the Ukraine conflict escalating into a third world war, as he pressed his case for foreign aid in an interview with the German state broadcaster ARD on Sunday. Zelenskiy said that if Russia attacked a Nato country, it would be “the beginning of the third world war”.
US military funding for Ukraine carries a key deterrent message for China, the head of Nato, Jens Stoltenberg, said on Sunday at the start of a visit to Washington aimed at lobbying Congress to continue funding the war against Russia. Joe Biden has asked Congress to approve $61bn in fresh aid to Ukraine.
The UK defence ministry believes that an increase in arson attacks on Russian enlistment offices “is highly likely due to a greater sense of dissatisfaction with the war among the Russian population”. There have been 220 attacks on Russian military enlistment offices since the start of the war in February 2022, with 113 in the last six months.
Russia launched drone and missile attacks targeting civilian and critical infrastructure across wide areas of Ukraine, Kyiv’s air force said on Sunday. Preliminary information did not show any casualties in the attacks.
Defence ministry officials conspired with employees from a Ukrainian arms firm to embezzle almost $40m earmarked to buy 100,000 mortar shells, Ukraine’s security service said. Five people have been charged, with one person detained trying to cross the Ukrainian border.
The beauty giant Avon has been criticised for its Russia links amid the ongoing war. At the outset of the conflict, the company said it was stopping investment in Russia, where it has a large worker base, and was ending exports from its Russian factory to other parts of the world. However, research by the BBC has discovered the company is still recruiting new sales agents in Russia, with recruits offered prizes, cash bonuses and even holidays for hitting targets, the broadcaster reports.
The hacking group NoName05716 claims to be preparing to target the Ukrainian government with help from other hacking groups 22С, Skillnet, CyberDragon, Federal Legion, People’s Cyber Army and Phoenix.
Updated
Ukraine and Hungary are interested in holding a meeting between their leaders as soon as possible, the Ukrainian foreign minister, Dmytro Kuleba, said on Monday after talks with his Hungarian counterpart, Péter Szijjártó, Reuters reports.
In comments reported by Ukraine’s Evropeiska Pravda media outlet, Kuleba also said the two countries had agreed to form a commission that would prepare proposals on the rights of the ethnic Hungarian minority living in Ukraine.
Budapest and Kyiv have been at odds over the minority issue. Hungary’s prime minister, Viktor Orbán, has retained cordial ties with Russia despite Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine nearly two years ago.
Updated
