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Stay on top of Russia-Ukraine war 02-28-2025 developments on the ground with KyivPost fact-based news, exclusive video footage, photos and updated war maps.
The US State Department is reportedly terminating aid to help restore Ukraine’s energy system devastated by Russian strikes, a decision made before the heated debate in the White House on Friday.
The US is terminating aid to help Ukraine restore its energy system that has been devastated by Russian attacks.
NBC News, citing two USAID officials working on the agency’s Ukraine mission, said the decision was made by the US State Department this week.
The Élysée Palace confirmed that Macron and Zelensky had a conversation but did not share details. Zelensky was also in contact with Rutte, Financial Times reported.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky spoke with French President Emmanuel Macron and NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte following a tense meeting with US President Donald Trump on Friday.
The Élysée Palace confirmed that Macron and Zelensky had a conversation but did not share details. Zelensky was also in contact with Rutte, according to The Financial Times.
The US president openly berated Zelensky for not being “thankful”, later accusing the Ukrainian leader of “not being ready for peace” and having “disrespected” the United States.
A raised-voice spat on Friday between Donald Trump and Volodymyr Zelensky sent shockwaves across the world, with the undiplomatic shouting match casting doubts over efforts to end the Russia-Ukraine war.
The US president openly berated Zelensky for not being “thankful”, later accusing the Ukrainian leader of “not being ready for peace” and having “disrespected” the United States in the “cherished Oval Office”.
Zelensky left the White House without signing a much-anticipated security deal with Trump after the two got into heated conversations on several topics during a press conference.
During a heated back-and-forth in the Oval Office on Friday between Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and US President Donald Trump meant to focus on a bilateral security deal to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Zelensky fact-checked the US leader in real-time as he repeated several wrong or misleading claims.
After fielding questions from reporters for about half an hour before the pair were to sign the agreement, Trump began to say that Zelensky was stalling on peace negotiations even though his country had been “destroyed” – a comment that seemed to push the Ukrainian president past his limits.
After their heated discussion, Trump posted a message on social media, claiming that Zelensky was “not ready for peace” and that he “disrespected the United States of America.”
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky left the White House earlier than planned after a meeting with US President Donald Trump.
After their heated discussion, Trump posted a message on social media, claiming that Zelensky was “not ready for peace” and that he “disrespected the United States of America.”
President Volodymyr Zelensky’s high-stakes meeting with his US counterpart is off to a rocky start, with the parties arguing live on TV.
President Volodymyr Zelensky’s high-stakes meeting on Friday with US President Donald Trump got off to a rocky start, and ended without a signing of the highly anticipated bilateral mineral rights deal that had been discussed for weeks.
After a series of heated debates between Zelensky and Trump and US Vice President JD Vance – live on television – wherein Trump and Vance accused Zelensky of not being “thankful” for US support and purportedly refusing a ceasefire, a reporter asked Vance what would happen if Moscow broke a ceasefire agreement, to which Trump chose to answer after Vance reiterated the question for him.
The two presidents clashed in a highly contentious press conference where Zelensky challenged Trump on several of his false or misleading statements.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky had a heated exchange unlike any before during a press conference with the US for a meeting with President Donald Trump in the White House on Friday as the two met to discuss a pending bilateral security pact.
Zelensky showed the American leader photos of some of the injured civilians and soldiers of Russia’s full-scale invasion so far before they accepted questions from reporters, and the talks became more testy.
From the minerals deal to what Ukraine might get out of a ceasefire, Timothy Ash takes it on in this question and answer
Despite US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, and others trying to row back on their comments at the Munich Security Conference (MSC) the damage already seems to have been done – both European NATO members, and importantly I think Russia, will have got the message.
I think the realization is sinking in from Europe, that they need an alternative now to NATO – and the US perhaps needs to take a step back and think through clearly what it means to wave goodbye to NATO, the most successful defense alliance in global history, and the mainstay of Western security over the past seventy odd years.
Russian forces are contained for now, Kyiv says
Russian infantry are storming the Ukrainian border from the Russian region of Kursk, near areas of the region that are controlled by Ukrainian forces, Kyiv said Friday.
Ukraine said that for the moment the offensive has been contained.
Kyiv Post’s Bohdan Nahaylo on what the Trump-Zelensky meeting means
In this video CBC interviews Kyiv Post Editor in Chief Bohdan Nahaylo about the meeting between Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and US President Donald Trump in Washington Friday with CBC’s Heather Hiscox.
The future outcome of the Russo-Ukrainian War, and the minerals agreement between the US and Ukraine are sure to be on the table.
Trump’s flattery toward the predator, as well as his rancorous negotiations with the leader of a country that has been victimized, are tactics.
Germany’s Otto von Bismarck once quipped about politics that “to retain respect for laws and sausages, one must not watch them in the making.”
The same applies to hard-nosed business negotiations, and the world has just witnessed Donald Trump demonstrate that he is not a statesman but a ruthless magnate.
The hundreds of billions of euros figures kicking around are between one-third and four-fifths of the entire United States defense budget.
Europe is on track to launch the most extensive and expensive arms and security increases seen on the continent since World War II, with announcements about sector priorities and cash contribution shares likely to be announced at a security conference scheduled for March 6.
Reports were conflicting on the exact shape of the to-be-announced defense spending package and on Friday officials across the continent told media talks were still ongoing multilaterally among European states, and inside the governments of countries key to that build-up like Britain, France and Germany.
Putin withdrew his former envoy to Washington, Anatoly Antonov, last October but had not named a replacement amid abysmal bilateral relations over Russia’s war in Ukraine
Russia on Friday named career diplomat Alexander Darchiev as new ambassador to the United States, filling a role vacant since last year in another sign of easing tensions.
US President Donald Trump has sought to restore ruptured ties with Moscow since taking office, reaching out to President Vladimir Putin and initiating high-level talks for the first time since Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
One of the three other facilities hit by Ukraine early Friday morning was the Ilsky Oil Refinery in Russia’s Krasnodar Krai, which supplies the Russian army.
Ukrainian forces destroyed a Russian thermobaric munitions warehouse early morning Friday in the occupied territory of the Donetsk region.
According to the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU), the warehouse was located in the Selydove area, a town in the Pokrovsk District.
Irish Prime Minister Micheál Martin reiterated Ireland’s support for Ukraine, including being open to sending troops to enforce a peace deal, upon meeting President Volodymyr Zelensky in Shannon.
Ireland is open to sending troops to Ukraine to help enforce a peace deal, Irish Prime Minister Micheál Martin reportedly told President Volodymyr Zelensky at Shannon Airport on Thursday.
Zelensky stopped off at Shannon en route to Washington where he intends to sign a framework agreement with US President Donald Trump on Ukraine’s mineral and gas resources on Friday.
A Danish volunteer has sent 500 tons of fishing nets to Ukraine, turning them into lifesaving shields against drones which Kyiv’s troops are now crucial for survival on the frontlines.
A Danish volunteer has sent 500 tons of fishing nets to Ukraine in the past few months, which the Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU) use as a shield protecting positions and equipment against drone attacks on the frontline.
The volunteer Carl Futtrup, told Kyiv Post, that “I have been at the forefront of sending protection nets to protect your soldiers from drone attacks.”
Zelensky arrived at the White House after meeting lawmakers in a bipartisan meeting. The two presidents are expected to sign a bilateral security deal involving Ukraine’s resources and US support.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has arrived in the US for a meeting with President Donald Trump to sign a much-anticipated security deal including Ukraine’s mineral resources after having a meeting with a bipartisan group of lawmakers on Capitol Hill.
“Our discussions focused on the continued military assistance for Ukraine, relevant legislative initiatives, my meeting with President Trump, efforts to achieve a just and lasting peace, our vision for ending the war, and the importance of robust security guarantees” Zelensky said in an X post after the meeting with congresspeople.
Russia has created a new 1,000-person filtration camp in Ukraine’s occupied territories in which those who don’t yet have a Russian passport are being checked for their loyalty to Moscow
Ukraine’s National Resistance Center (CNS) reported on Thursday that Russian forces have set up a new 1,000-person filtration camp in which to process the residents of Ukrainian territories that Moscow occupied in 2024.
The CNS report says that the population from these areas are being forcibly taken there to check for any cooperation with Ukraine’s defense forces after which, once their loyalty is assured, they are compulsorily issued with a Russian passport.
During Tuesday’s Senate Armed Services Committee hearing, Sen. Mark Kelly questioned Pentagon’s deputy chief nominee Stephen Feinberg about Russia’s invasion, to which he received no answer.
Stephen Feinberg, Pentagon’s deputy chief nominee, dodged a question from Sen. Mark Kelly on whether Russia invaded Ukraine during a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing on Tuesday.
According to a recording of the hearing released by Forbes, Kelly asked the nominee: “Mr. Feinberg, did Russia invade Ukraine?”
Xi called China and Russia “friendly neighbours” and said the two sides would “maintain close communication at all levels”.
Chinese President Xi Jinping on Friday met top Russian security official Sergei Shoigu in Beijing, Chinese state media said.
Shoigu’s trip comes days after Xi spoke with his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin, with the Chinese leader hailing Moscow’s “positive efforts to defuse” the Ukraine crisis.
Meaghan Mobbs, daughter of Gen. Keith Kellogg, Trump’s Ukraine envoy, heads a charity that supports Ukraine. In an exclusive interview, she talks to Kyiv Post about the US moral obligation to help.
“A peace at all costs is not peace at all, it’s surrender, so we have to be very careful about what peace means,” says Meaghan Mobbs, the daughter of Lt. Gen (Ret.) Keith Kellogg, US President Donald Trump’s special envoy for Ukraine and Russia. Mobbs is the president of the R.T. Weatherman Foundation, a charity that has been supporting Ukraine since the start of the full-scale war.
Following the recent visit of her father, Keith Kellogg, to Kyiv, where he met with President Volodymyr Zelensky, public attention turned to Meaghan Mobbs. As the head of the R.T. Weatherman Foundation, she has played a key role in providing humanitarian aid to Ukraine for at least the past three years.
As of 9 a.m., 107 drones have been confirmed shot down across Kharkiv, Kyiv, Poltava, Sumy, Chernihiv, and several other regions.
Russian troops launched 208 Shahed-type unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) and decoy drones over Ukraine on the evening of Feb. 27 and into the early morning hours of Feb. 28, with about half shot down by air defenses.
According to the Ukrainian Air Force’s Telegram channel, air defense forces successfully destroyed 107 of the drones. The UAVs were launched from Russian cities, including Orel, Bryansk, Kursk, Millerovo, Shatalovo, and Primorsko-Akhtarsk.
Ukraine has worked out how to jam Russia’s powerful glide bombs, which helped drive its advances in The Donbas in 2024, reports say.
Ukraine has worked out how to jam Russia’s powerful glide bombs, which helped drive its advances in The Donbas in 2024, reports say.
Powerful Soviet-era bombs adapted with satellite guidance systems and pop-up wings have terrorized Ukraine’s frontline troops because of their accuracy and were almost impossible to intercept.
Ukraine’s military intel chief explains why his country’s enemy is facing economic collapse… and reveals why the brutal conflict has become so personal for him.
He is a decorated war hero, the survivor of numerous assassination attempts and the head of the Ukrainain military’s Main Intelligence Directorate (HUR). Few men have given more blood, sweat and tears towards Ukraine’s war effort against Russia than Lt. Gen. Kyrylo Budanov.
While some men of his age – he recently entered his 40th year – have been fighting Russians for three years since the all-out invasion of Feb. 24, 2022, Gen. Budanov has been at the forefront of the war effort for over a decade.
Zelensky is heading to Washington to sign a major resource deal with the US on rare earths—but without the security guarantees Ukraine has been pushing for. It is already drawing sharp criticism.
Ukraine and the United States are set to sign a framework agreement on the joint development and export of Ukrainian mineral resources such as oil, gas, uranium, coal and rare earths. Volodymyr Zelensky, who will travel to Washington on Friday to sign the deal, has said it does not include US security guarantees. The media take a critical stance.
Cynically exploiting desperation
Latest from the British Defence Intelligence.
The meeting will focus on strengthening Ukraine’s position through continued military aid and increased economic pressure on Russia.
UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer is set to host a major summit on Sunday, bringing together more than a dozen European leaders to advance support for Ukraine and bolster security efforts.
As per AFP citing his office announcement, before the main summit, Starmer will lead a morning call with Baltic leaders, followed by a meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky at Downing Street to discuss the ongoing war with Russia.
Anders Fogh Rasmussen, former secretary general of NATO, says Europe must consider its own nuclear deterrent as President Donald Trump has thrown the post-World War II order into doubt.
Anders Fogh Rasmussen, former secretary general of NATO, says Europe must consider its own nuclear deterrent as President Donald Trump has thrown the post-World War II order into doubt.
Rasmussen, speaking with Adam Jasser, News Director of TVP World, for the “On The Record” program, said: “European leaders are facing a stark reality if NATO’s strongest member can no longer be counted on, then the alliance itself may be at risk.
According to an official statement, both sides identified “concrete initial steps” to improve diplomatic mission operations.
The United States and Russia have agreed to hold further diplomatic talks following a meeting in Istanbul on Feb. 27, though details regarding the next round—such as date, location, and participants—remain undetermined.
According to a US State Department media note, the meeting was led by US Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Russia and Central Europe Sonata Coulter and Russian Ambassador Aleksandr Darchiyev.
Budanov called top security official Koziura’s detention one of the most significant infiltrations ever exposed, as SBU Chief personally led the operation against the alleged Russian FSB agent.
During the full-scale invasion, there were no infiltrations of Russian spies within the Main Intelligence Directorate of Ukraine.
This was stated by Kyrylo Budanov, Head of Ukraine’s defense intelligence (HUR), in an interview with Ukrinform, while commenting on the detention of Head of the SSU Anti-Terrorist Center Dmytro Koziura.
The US president said he was “open to many things” in terms of security guarantees but that he wanted to get a Russia-Ukraine deal in place first.
Donald Trump took a softer tone on Ukraine truce talks Thursday as he hosted British Prime Minister Keir Starmer -- but refused to give any firm commitments on the US security guarantees Europe desperately wants.
In an upbeat meeting, the US president handed Starmer a win on a possible trade deal, while the British leader pandered to Trump’s love of the royal family with a invitation for a state visit from King Charles III.
Latest from the Institute for the Study of War.
Key Takeaways from the ISW:
The Big Meet is Kyiv’s premier networking event – It’s a space where expats, locals, and everyone in between come together to connect, share experiences, and build a sense of community.
The Big Meet is more than just an event; it’s a space where expats, locals, and everyone in between come together to connect, share experiences, and build a sense of community.
Held regularly at some of Kyiv’s trendiest venues, The Big Meet has grown into a vital platform for fostering friendships and supporting good causes. A percentage of each event’s proceeds goes to charity, making every gathering not only fun but meaningful.
The ISW reports that, as talks between US and Russia continue, the Kremlin has been increasing its outreach to China, Iran and North Korea, focusing on the “root causes” of the war in Ukraine.
Mirroring the increasing diplomacy between the US, European partners and Ukraine, Russia has been throttling forward in new discussions with America’s enemies, in particular.
The Washington-based think-tank, the Institute for the Study of War (ISW), released a report on Thursday hammering home the point that Russian leader Vladimir Putin, concurrent with diplomatic talks with the US about ending the war in Ukraine, has been busy trying to build his “strategic cooperation” with Chinese President Xi Jinping, and Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian.
“The only thing that really works, the only security guarantee that works, is NATO’s umbrella,” Kaja Kallas says.
The EU’s top diplomat said Thursday that NATO offered the best security guarantee for Ukraine, accusing President Donald Trump of falling for a Russian narrative by closing the door.
In an interview with AFP on a visit to Washington, Kaja Kallas also warned that the Europeans would not be able to assist in an eventual ceasefire deal in Ukraine’s three-year conflict with Russia unless they are included by Trump, who has reached out directly to Russian President Vladimir Putin.
More awkward interactions between the US leader and European guests to the White House, as Starmer pushes back on comments from Trump and his Vice President about Ukraine and the free press.
There were more uncomfortable exchanges in the White House on Thursday, as visiting UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer had to correct both President Donald Trump and Vice President JD Vance in what the US media was calling another “Macron moment.”
The scene was reminiscent of French President Emanuel Macron’s visit to the White House on Monday, when the French leader felt the need to grab Trump by the forearm mid-response and interject that Europe was not, in fact, going to be repaid for most of its aid sent to Ukraine over the course of Russia’s three-year invasion.
