Summary
Here’s a roundup of the key developments from the day:
Russia and Ukraine continue to dispute the circumstances surrounding the crash of a Russian military transport plane in the border region of Belgorod on Wednesday. The crash killed all 74 people onboard. Russia claims the plane was carrying 65 Ukrainian PoW who were to be swapped, and that Ukrainian forces shot it down.
The black boxes from the plane have been delivered to a special laboratory in Moscow for analysis, Russian state media said. Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, has called for full clarity over the crash, accusing Moscow of “playing with the lives of Ukrainian prisoners of war”.
The Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich has lost an appeal against his arrest, Russian state news agencies report. A court in Moscow extended the pretrial detention until the end of March, meaning the journalist will have spent at least a year behind bars in Russia.
The former Nato security general George Robertson has told Sky News that the Ukrainians are “fighting for us” and “we need to do more”. He said if Russia were to defeat Ukraine, the “rest of us” would then be in danger because Putin would be “fuelled by any success that he has in Ukraine”.
Ukraine has invited Xi Jinping, the Chinese president, to participate in peace talks, Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s top adviser has said. Switzerland has agreed to hold the summit, which a number of world leaders will attend, but no venue or date has been set just yet.
In a letter to House Republicans, the speaker, Mike Johnson, warned that an immigration deal under consideration in the Senate may be “dead on arrival” in his chamber. The Republican leader’s statement bodes ill for the bargaining in the Senate, which is seen as crucial to unlocking GOP support for aid to Ukraine, as well as for Israel and Taiwan.
We are closing this liveblog now. Thanks so much for joining us.
Updated
Finland’s leading presidential candidate has said foreign policy and security are “existential” issues for the Nordic country, as it prepares to head to the polls on Sunday for the first time since joining Nato.
Speaking on Friday at a breakfast event in Helsinki at a cafe named after him, Alexander Stubb, who was prime minister from 2014 to 2015, said he had thought he was finished with national politics. But Russia’s invasion of Ukraine had changed his mind.
Debates between the nine candidates hoping to take over from Finland’s two-term president Sauli Niinistö in March had been “very constructive”, said Stubb, of the centre-right National Coalition party. He said all candidates were qualified for the role.
He remains the frontrunner but polls have recently tightened between the top three candidates. Stubb’s lead over the former foreign minister and Green candidate Pekka Haavisto has slimmed and Jussi Halla-aho, of the far-right Finns party, is catching up in third. The top two candidates are expected to move to a second round.
Stubb, 55, said: “The debates have been very constructive and there’s a reason for that. For Finland, foreign policy, security policy, is existential, so it’s very consensual.” Discussions have centred on foreign policy, the president’s role as commander-in-chief and the candidates’ values. “So you get a lot of questions about Russia, Ukraine, Gaza, US-China, US elections, Finnish Nato membership,” he said.
After eight years in government – as highlighted by his campaign posters, which are emblazoned with the number in a big yellow font – Stubb said his return had been spurred by Vladimir Putin’s invasion.
“Having been in government for eight consecutive years and having held all the key portfolios, I felt in 2016 that I had very much done it for God and country, as they say. My plan was not to return to politics, or certainly not to national politics … but Putin’s attack on Ukraine changed it.”
After Finland joined Nato at record speed last April, he believes the country is entering “a new age in Finnish foreign policy”.
Read more here:
Updated
