FIGHTING IN KURSK REGION
As moves have gathered pace for a ceasefire, Moscow has pushed this week to retake a large part of the land that Ukraine originally captured in western Kursk.
But Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who joined the talks, denied on Saturday any “encirclement” of his troops in the Kursk region.
“Our troops continue to hold back Russian and North Korean groupings in the Kursk region,” he said on social media.
The Russian defence ministry said troops took control over the villages of Zaoleshenka and Rubanshchina – north and west of the town of Sudzha, the main town that Moscow reclaimed this week.
Kyiv meanwhile said its air force had overnight downed 130 Iranian-made Russian-launched Shahed drones over 14 regions of the country.
Putin has called on embattled Ukrainian troops in Kursk to “surrender”, while his US counterpart Donald Trump urged the Kremlin to spare their lives.
“The Kremlin’s complete disregard for President Trump’s ceasefire proposal only serves to demonstrate that Putin is not serious about peace,” Starmer said late on Friday ahead of the call.
Starmer and French President Emmanuel Macron have been leading efforts to assemble a so-called “coalition of the willing” ever since Trump opened direct negotiations with Moscow last month.
They say the group is necessary – along with US support – to provide Ukraine with security guarantees by deterring Putin from violating any ceasefire.
Starmer and Macron have said they are willing to put British and French troops on the ground in Ukraine but it is not clear if other countries are keen on doing the same.
“STOP THE VIOLENCE”
Macron also called on Russia late on Friday to accept the proposal for a ceasefire, and stop making statements aimed at “delaying the process”.
The French president also demanded that Moscow stop its “acts of violence” in Ukraine.
Germany on Friday likewise criticised Putin’s response to the US-proposed ceasefire in Ukraine as “at best a delaying tactic”.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Friday he was “cautiously optimistic” about reaching a truce, but acknowledged there was “a lot of work that remains to be done”.
Starmer has said he welcomes any offer of support for the coalition, raising the prospect that some countries could contribute logistics or surveillance.
But Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni reiterated after the call, which she joined, that Italy’s “participation in a possible military force on the ground is not envisaged”.
British Commonwealth partners Canada, Australia and New Zealand have been involved in early talks and dialled into the summit.
NATO chief Mark Rutte and European Union chiefs von der Leyen and Antonio Costa also took part, along with the leaders of Germany, Spain, Portugal, Latvia, Romania, Turkey and the Czech Republic among others.
