Ukraine-Russia war latest: Putin’s forces launch five-hour drone assault on Kyiv in one of conflict’s largest attacks – UK Times

Poland’s newly elected president Karol Nawrocki has warned that Russia is the “biggest threat” his country faces, as he expressed a desire to meet with Hungary’s Viktor Orban, who is perhaps the European leader most closely aligned with Vladimir Putin.

It was not yet clear what Mr Nawrocki’s policy on Ukraine would be, but he reiterated that he opposed Kyiv’s plans to join the European Union.

However, Poland supports Ukraine strategically, because “the greatest threat to me, as an anti-communist, and in my opinion to the entire region, is the Russian Federation”, he said.

Mr Nawrocki claimed that “Ukraine must also understand that other countries – including Poland, Hungary, and other European nations – have interests of their own.”

And in his first foreign interview, given to a Hungarian magazine Mandiner, Mr Nawrocki said that Budapest is a “very important partner for Poland”, adding: “We are facing serious tasks, such as building the Visegrad Group, which will be an important format for me, as well as strengthening Nato’s eastern flank and the Bucharest Nine.”

He added: “I certainly wish to meet prime minister Viktor Orban, who is a very effective politician, as proven by his repeated election results in Hungary. And I count on good cooperation with him, just as with other countries, in the interest of the region.”

Mr Orban said on Friday that Mr Nawrocki’s victory was “fantastically good”, hailing the success of an ally of US president Donald Trump.

A Ukraine maternity hospital has been hit after Russia launched a deadly wave of drones and missiles in an attack on Odesa early Tuesday morning (10 June).

At least two people were killed and nine injured in the attack with the maternity hospital and residential buildings in the centre of the southern port city damaged, regional Gov. Oleh Kiper said.

The fresh attacks came hours after Moscow launched almost 500 drones at Ukraine in the biggest overnight drone bombardment in the three-year war.

Ukrainian and Western officials have been anticipating a Russian response to Ukraine’s audacious June 1 drone attack on distant Russian air bases.

Political commitment to Ukraine’s future in Nato will not change even if it is not explicitly mentioned in a communique published following a summit in the Hague, Nato secretary-general Mark Rutte said on Monday.

“The irreversible path of Ukraine into NATO is there, and it is my assumption that it is still there after the summit,” Mr Rutte said at Chatham House in London, according to The Kyiv Independent.

“Whether it is again in the communique or not, I think that’s not relevant, because all the language we previously agreed on is there — until we decide it is no longer there.”

The Nato summit will take place from June 24-25, and Mr Rutte said the following communique may exclude Russia and Ukraine.

Our world affairs editor Sam Kiley writes:

Nato chief Mark Rutte has called for a 400 per cent boost to air and missile capabilities and his demand to raise defence spending across the alliance to 5 per cent has raised the voices of doom to a scream.

A return to Cold War levels of defence spending is not, however an hysterical plea from a lackey of the military-industrial complex.

It is a sad acknowledgement that the peace dividend that came with the collapse of the Soviet Union has been squandered by the West in a pointless war in Afghanistan and a criminal conflict in Iraq which expanded the lists of peoples with a good reason to hate democracy.

But there were plenty around already. Vladimir Putin is one of them, Xi Jinping is another – Donald Trump is rushing to their ranks. Autocracy is on the rise around the world while democracies have been consumed by complacency.

“Wishful thinking will not keep us safe,” said Rutte, who called for Nato to become a “stronger, fairer and more lethal alliance”.

Even as it pounds Ukraine, Russia is expanding its military footprint in Africa, delivering sophisticated weaponry to sub-Saharan conflict zones where a Kremlin-controlled armed force is on the rise.

Skirting sanctions imposed by Western nations, Moscow is using cargo ships to send tanks, armored vehicles, artillery and other high-value equipment to West Africa, The Associated Press has found.

Slovak leader Robert Fico is seeking to install “a dam against progressivism” by declaring that Slovakia’s legal precedence on “national identity” issues, such as family and gender.

Critics of populist Prime Minister Fico, including some legal experts, fear the amendment will threaten Slovakia’s commitments to European Union laws and international treaties.

Mr Fico has taken an increasingly anti-liberal stance in rights issues, building on his pro-Russian and pro-Hungarian international policy position. He has promoted closer relations with Russia and China and criticised sanctions on Moscow and the EU’s military aid for Ukraine.

The amendment states that only male and female will be recognised as genders, and that school curriculums must respect the constitution, including its cultural and ethical positions. It will also tighten adoption rules.

“The Slovak Republic maintains sovereignty above all in issues of national identity,” the amendments say, in particular on cultural and ethical issues.

The EU Commission has proposed an 18th sanctions package against Russia for its invasion of Ukraine, president Ursula von der Leyen said on Tuesday.

Aimed at Moscow’s energy revenues, banks and military industry, the sanctions will see transactions with Russia’s Nord Stream gas pipelines banned, as well as banks who engage in sanctions circumvention.

“Russia’s goal is not peace, it is to impose the rule of might … strength is the only language that Russia will understand,” Ms von der Leyen told a news conference.

The Commission has proposed lowering the Group of Seven nations (G7) price cap on Russian crude oil to $45 a barrel from $60 barrel in a bid to cut Russia’s energy revenues.

It also lists more vessels that make up Russia’s shadow fleet and oil trading companies.