Ukraine Breaking News Today Live on 04-13-2025

From the start of the Trump administration, there has been a clash in the transatlantic view of foreign policy, particularly noticeable is how best to resolve Russia’s war on Ukraine.

In the first few months of 2025, there has been a widely publicized divergence in foreign policy interests between the US President Donald Trump’s administration on the one hand and most European governments on the other.

While the new president has been more willing to make concessions to Russia and pressure Ukraine in order to bring about an end to the Russian-Ukrainian war. Yet most European governments have remained staunchly supportive of Ukraine and suspicious of Russia.

“Two Days Before Chasiv Yar” is a film by Sweden-based filmmaker Adrian van den Broeck, shot near the frontline a day before the AFU 24th Mechanized Brigade was deployed to Chasiv Yar.

A young Ukrainian girl who escaped from the war aims to follow in Elina Svitolina’s footsteps and become Ukraine’s first world no. 1 ranked player.

Thanks to the efforts of tennis.com writer Peter Bodo, Ukrainian tennis prodigy Vlada Hranchar earned a tryout with legendary tennis coach Rick Macci (who has worked with, among others, the Williams sisters, Jennifer Capriati and Andy Roddick). The tryout turned into a scholarship to Macci’s famed tennis academy in Boca Raton, Florida, for the eight-year-old at the end of 2023.

Vlada’s parents, Dmytro and Maryna Hranchar, survived a harrowing escape from their home in Ukraine in the wake of the Russian invasion, ending up in Vermont. Realizing the state was not a tennis hotbed, the family established a relationship with Bodo and after nearly two years of searching for a new permanent home, found one in Florida.

Russian forces shelled Kupiansk in Kharkiv region with MLRS, killing two women in a residential courtyard in yet another attack targeting civilians.

Russian troops launched an attack on Kupiansk using multiple rocket launchers (MLRS). As a result of the strike, two women were killed.

This was reported on Telegram by Oleh Syniehubov, Head of the Kharkiv Regional Military Administration, according to Ukrinform.

Now that the US is insisting that Ukraine capitulate to Russia, it is up to Europe to prevent Moscow from achieving its goals of conquering Ukraine and destroying European unity.

The war in Ukraine has stalled. After Ukraine recaptured Kherson in the south in late 2022, the front has moved only marginally. Since Trump supports Putin, Ukraine can no longer count on the United States. Instead, Europe and other willing coalition partners need to compensate for the US mistakes and make it possible to Ukraine to win.

Essentially, three elements are needed. First of all, the West needs to provide Ukraine with air supremacy or a no-fly zone over Ukraine and deliver the best of its modern arms to Ukraine. Second, the West needs to double its financial support to Ukraine. Third, the only swift way of doing so is to seize the $300 billion of frozen Russian Central Bank assets in the West.

New oversight demands from USAGM contravene federal law and require more bureaucracy

(WASHINGTON) — Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) has filed an updated emergency request in the U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C., asking the court to order the United States Agency for Global Media (USAGM) to disburse RFE/RL’s Congressionally appropriated funds for the month of April. 

The filing comes after USAGM informed RFE/RL that the agency would impose unlawful restrictions before disbursing any funding, including a requirement that USAGM have ultimate control over the selection of RFE/RL’s Board of Directors. 

Russia struck the city of Sumy with ballistic missiles, killing over 30 people and injuring dozens more, in yet another deadly attack on civilians near the Russian border.

UPDATED: As of 1:40 PM, 31 people have been confirmed dead, including 2 children. A total of 84 people were injured, including 10 children. Russia struck the center of Sumy with two ballistic missiles.

“Russia struck directly at the city center with a ballistic missile. Right at the time when the streets were full of people. A deliberate targeting of civilians on a major religious holiday,” said Ukraine’s Interior Minister Ihor Klymenko.

Trump said Ukraine-Russia talks “might be going OK” but warned it’s time to “put up or shut up,” showing frustration as US efforts to push for a deal face delays.

U.S. President Donald Trump said on Saturday that talks aimed at ending the war in Ukraine may be going OK, but “there’s a point at which you just have to either put up or shut up.”

Trump made the comment to reporters a day after he showed frustration with Russia and told it to “get moving” on reaching a deal.

Although they have long upheld the Christian tradition of pacifism, Ukrainian Protestants have been forced to reassess their ideas as they come to terms with unrelenting Russian violence.

When Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, it didn’t just redraw borders and shatter homes – it fractured churches. Ukraine’s Protestant believers found themselves in a more complicated position. Their faith, often rooted in pacifism and the universality of brotherhood under God, was suddenly at odds with the brutal reality of war. As Russian missiles fell and soldiers mobilized, some Protestants picked up rifles. Others held onto prayer and hesitated.

Protestantism in Ukraine, which includes Baptists, Pentecostals, and Seventh-day Adventists, saw a revival after the fall of the Soviet Union. Today, Protestants make up around 2-4% of Ukraine’s population, but their influence, especially in central and western regions, has grown through missionary work, youth programs, and humanitarian aid. Many of these churches have long emphasized peace, reconciliation, and service, making the pivot to wartime roles uncomfortable for some.

Russia launched around 30 drones at Kyiv; air defenses shot down 19. No casualties or damage reported, but Russia continues targeting civilians in violation of international law.

In the early hours of Sunday, April 13, Russia launched a drone attack on Kyiv, releasing around 30 unmanned aerial vehicles. Air raid alerts were issued three times in the capital, lasting a total of four hours. According to the Kyiv City Military Administration, Ukrainian air defense forces shot down 19 drones over and near the city. Air defense operations also continued in other regions along the drones’ flight paths.

The city’s military administration reported no casualties or infrastructure damage within Kyiv as a result of the attack and expressed gratitude to Ukraine’s Defense Forces for protecting the capital’s skies.

Latest from the British Defence Intelligence.

• On 21 March 2025, the Central Bank of Russia (CBR) decided to hold the key interest rate at 21 per cent. Interest rates are at their highest level in over 20 years, compared to a pre-war interest rate of 8.5 per cent in January 2022. While interest rates remain high, the number of corporate bankruptcies will highly likely increase in Russia.
• In November 2024, the ruble depreciated to its lowest rate since the beginning of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022 (114 per US Dollar). The ruble has since appreciated to a high of 81 per US dollar in March 2025. The appreciation of the ruble will highly likely reduce federal revenues from oil and gas, in ruble terms, increasing pressures on the federal deficit.
• Despite the ruble’s appreciation, inflation has continued to rise. In February 2025, inflation rose to 10.1 per cent from 8.5 per cent in October 2024, when the interest rate of 21 per cent was introduced. Labour shortages, alongside high levels of government spending, almost certainly mean inflation will remain above the CBR’s target of 4 per cent through 2025. Long term inflationary pressure will highly likely exacerbate pressures on Russia’s ability to sustain high defence spending.

Germany’s new leader elaborates on his gloomy prospects for Ukraine and Russia.

Future German Chancellor Friedrich Merz supports Ukraine joining the EU and NATO, but only after the end of the Russian-Ukrainian war.

In an interview published in Handelsblatt on April 12, he noted that Ukraine “is “a very large European country, but it is a European country at war.”

Ukraine’s Justice Ministry Hires Hogan Lovells US to Help Craft Agreement with USA.

Ukraine’s Ministry of Justice has hired the Washington-based law firm Hogan Lovells US to represent its interests in drafting an agreement with the United States on critical minerals.

This information appears in the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA) database, where the firm registered on April 9, 2025, as acting on behalf of the Ukrainian Ministry of Justice.

Refugees inside Ukraine are poorer than those who went abroad – but Ukraine’s Ministry of Social Policy knows about the problem and is seeking ways to enhance their wellbeing.

A total 39% of female Ukrainian refugees who relocated inside the country after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine only have finances sufficient to cover their needs for food and lack cash to purchase clothes, large purchases or luxury items. 

Researchers from the Institute for Behavioral Studies at the American University of Kyiv (AUK) came to these conclusions in their report, “What motivates women to stay in Ukraine?,” after interviewing 2,018 females, aged 18-60. 

Lavrov praised Donald Trump for supposedly understanding the Ukraine conflict better than other Western leaders, citing his stance on NATO as addressing a key root cause of the war.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov praised US President Donald Trump on Saturday for what he said was a better understanding of the Ukraine conflict than any other Western leader.

Lavrov said understanding the underlying reasons for the war was key to resolving it.

Donald Trump has extended for one year the Russia sanctions imposed by Joe Biden in 2021 over threats to US security and Russia’s war against Ukraine.

U.S. President Donald Trump has signed an executive order extending for one year the sanctions against Russia that were introduced in April 2021 by President Joe Biden due to the Russian government’s harmful foreign activities, and later expanded in March 2022 after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

The document, dated April 10, was published in the U.S. Federal Register, according to Ukrinform.

In this “special issue” of this occasional series on the perversity of Russia’s view of the world, we highlight how it is putting George Orwell’s 1984 ideas of “thought control” into action.

Just as in “1984” – George Orwell’s dystopian vision – Moscow is now attempting not only to tell its citizens WHAT to think, but HOW to think. These recent actions show how elements of Orwell’s “concept” are being put into practice.

Anna Kuznetsova – deputy speaker of Russia’s State Duma

To understand President Trump’s foreign policy, look at his political idols: William McKinley, James K. Polk, and Vladimir Putin.

US President Donald Trump didn’t just rewrite America’s foreign policy – he tried to reprogram it. He pulled the US out of alliances, slapped tariffs on allies and rivals alike, praised dictators, and flirted with tearing up the Constitution itself. It all looked chaotic.

But there’s a method buried inside the madness.