rewrite Russia-Ukraine war latest: Starmer willing to face down Putin with British troops as European leaders hold crunch talks in 6 to 8 words

Russia launched 147 drones during an overnight attack, the Ukrainian military said this morning.

Out of the 147, Ukraine’s air force shot down 83 and 59 more did not reach their targets, likely due to electronic countermeasures.

French president Emmanuel Macron has called leaders from key EU nations and the UK to the Elysee Palace today for an emergency meeting on how to deal with the US, a once rock-solid partner.

The move follows a week–long diplomatic blitz on Ukraine by the Trump administration that seemed to embrace the Kremlin while it offered the cold-shoulder to many of its age-old European allies.

Despite belligerent warnings for months prior to Donald Trump’s reelection, EU leaders publicly hoped Mr Trump would stand by their side when it came to Ukraine’s defence.

But a flurry of speeches by vice president JD Vance and defence secretary Pete Hegseth during their initial visits to Europe last week questioned both Europe’s security commitments and its fundamental democratic principles.

Annalena Baerbock, Germany’s foreign minister, called this week “an existential moment. It’s a moment where Europe has to stand up.”Mr Macron will have afternoon talks with the leaders of Germany, the United Kingdom, Italy, Poland, Spain, the Netherlands, Denmark and the European Union on how to deal with Europe’s security quandary. Nato secretary general Mark Rutte will also attend.

French officials said no firm decisions are expected to emerge beyond a show of unity of European leaders.”There is a wind of unity blowing over Europe, as we perhaps have not felt since the Covid period,” said French foreign minister Jean-Noel Barrot.

The European Union must be involved in negotiations with Russia over the end of the Ukraine war in order to map out Europe’s future security, EU Council president Antonio Costa told the Financial Times in an interview published on Monday.

“If Trump really wants that the Europeans assume greater responsibility for their own security, then of course the Europeans need to be the key actor in designing the new security architecture,” he said.

“It is not only about Ukraine. The negotiations on the new security architecture need to take into account that Russia is a global threat, not only a threat to Ukraine.”

US secretary of state Marco Rubio arrived in Saudi Arabia this morning ahead of expected talks with Russian officials aimed at ending Moscow’s nearly three-year war in Ukraine.

The talks come after president Donald Trump last week spoke to Russian president Vladimir Putin by phone and ordered top officials to begin negotiations on the war, which he repeatedly vowed to end during his presidential campaign.

Riyadh, which is also involved in talks with Washington over the future of the Gaza Strip, has played a role in early contacts between the Trump administration and Moscow, helping to secure a prisoner swap last week.

Mr Rubio, who spoke by phone with his Russian counterpart foreign minister Sergei Lavrov on Saturday, will meet Russian officials in Saudi Arabia alongside Trump’s national security adviser Mike Waltz and White House Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff, a US lawmaker and a source told Reuters. It was not immediately clear who they would meet from Russia.

Russian newspaper Kommersant reported that the talks would take place tomorrow in the Saudi capital Riyadh, citing unnamed sources.

The talks will be among the first high-level in-person discussions in years between Russian and US officials and are meant to precede a meeting between the US and Russian presidents.

Mr Rubio on Sunday said the coming weeks and days would determine whether Mr Putin is serious about making peace.

“I told them that I want the equivalent of like $500 billion worth of rare earths, and they’ve essentially agreed to do that.”

China, with whom Trump has threatened a trade war, is the world’s largest producer of rare earths and many other critical minerals. Both the U.S and Europe have sought to reduce their dependence on Beijing.

The acceleration in Ukraine diplomacy means Europe needs to do more and in a better way, a French presidency official said ahead of informal talks later on Monday among several key European leaders in Paris.

US president Donald Trump stunned European allies in Nato and Ukraine last week when he announced he had held a call with Russian president Vladimir Putin without consulting them and would start a peace process.

Mr Trump’s Ukraine envoy Keith Kellogg jolted Europe further on Saturday when he said it would not have a seat at the table for the peace talks, even after Washington sent a questionnaire to European capitals to ask what they could contribute to security guarantees for Kyiv.

In the same six-point questionnaire, the US asked European allies in Nato what they would need from Washington to participate in Ukraine security arrangements.

“We believe that, as a result of the acceleration on the Ukrainian issue, and also as a result of what American leaders are saying, there is a need for Europeans to do more, better and in a coherent manner for our collective security,” the official told reporters.

Volodymyr Zelensky has warned that the risk Russia will occupy Europe is “100 per cent” if the US leaves Nato, adding intelligence showed 150,000 of Putin’s soldiers amassing in neighbouring Belarus.

The Ukrainian president issued the stark warning during an interview with NBC News, where he stressed that he trusted President Donald Trump, but would not accept any ceasefire deal conducted without Ukraine at the negotiating table.

Mr Zelensky voiced his concern that Putin was waiting for the weakening of Nato, and that the withdrawal of US military support in Europe would place his country and former Soviet bloc countries in a “difficult position”.

He told Kristen Welker: “There are risks that this can be Poland and Lithuania because we believe – we believe that Putin will wage war against Nato.”

Russia’s air defence units intercepted and destroyed 90 Ukrainian drones overnight, the Russian defence ministry said on Monday.

Thirty-eight of the drones were downed over the Sea of Azov, 24 over the southern Russia region of Krasnodar, and the rest over several other regions in the south and west of the country, as well as over the Crimean Peninsula, the ministry said in a post on the Telegram messaging app.

The ministry said that its defence units also destroyed a guided missile over the Sea of Azov.

Ukrainian forces have recaptured the village of Pischane to the southwest of Pokrovsk, according to military officials, amid growing signs that Russia’s advance is slowing.

Russian progress in Ukraine has stalled, with the high rate of Russian casualties having a demoralising effect on combat units, according to Russian bloggers.

Major Viktor Trehubov, a spokesperson for Ukraine’s ground forces in the east, told the Guardian that 7,000 Russian soldiers died in January in the battle for Pokrovsk, and 15,000 are wounded or missing.