Ukraine war live updates: Boris Johnson says Putin threatened him with missile strike in pre-call; Berlin rules out fighter jets for Kyiv
Ukraine is pressing its allies for faster weapons supplies as intense fighting continues in the eastern Donetsk region.
Following a weekend of attacks on the cities of Kharkiv and Kherson and ongoing battles around Bakhmut in Donetsk, Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Sunday that “Russia hopes to drag out the war, to exhaust our forces. So we have to make time our weapon. We must ... speed up the supply and opening of new necessary weaponry options for Ukraine.”
Ukraine’s allies agreed last week to provide the country with heavy battle tanks, with Kyiv then pressing for fighter jets too. One Ukrainian governent advisor was reported stating Saturday that “negotiations” were taking place over the possibility of sending fighter aircraft.
Germany’s Chancellor Olaf Scholz insisted over the weekend that fighter jets would not be provided to Ukraine, however, telling a German newspaper that “the question of combat aircraft does not arise at all,” Scholz told the Tagesspiegel newspaper in an interview published Sunday.
Erdogan suggests Turkey could accept Finland into NATO — without Sweden
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan handed another blow to Sweden’s NATO bid, suggesting that his government could approve Finland’s NATO membership application without its Nordic neighbor.
Finland and Sweden both formally applied to join the 73-year-old defense alliance in May of last year, reversing their long-held policy of nonalignment in the wake of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. The two have vowed to take their steps forward in tandem.
Erdogan, angry at Sweden’s government for a number of reasons, is poised to make or break both countries’ NATO accession plans, as each state’s application requires unanimous approval from all 30 current members. Hungary is the only country besides Turkey that is yet to approve the Nordic countries’ bids, which the rest of the member states want to fast-track.
“We may deliver Finland a different message [on their application], and Sweden would be shocked when they see our message. But Finland should not make the same mistake Sweden did,” Erdogan said during a speech on Sunday.
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