Russia Ukraine war latest: Trump claims he will ‘bring peace to the world’ after phone call with Zelensky

This weekend 25,000 music lovers are gathering for Ukraine’s biggest music festival, an annual event that hasn’t been held since Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022.

Journalist Paul Niland shared a video on X of a large crowd watching the Ukrainian rock band BoomBox on stage. The billing this year will understandably mostly be made up of domestic talent, though the event has previously had headline acts from global stars like Kasabian, The Chemical Brothers and Liam Gallagher.

Speaking to the BBC, event organiser Vlad Yaremchuk explained how the festival is being conducted in a car park outside one of Kyiv’s biggest shopping malls – so if a Russian air attack does take place, “there will be more than enough space to get everyone evacuated quickly — and we’re talking minutes”. The mall has a capacity of 100,000, he says.

So far the festival, running from Friday to Sunday, is going smoothly. It already had to be pushed back one week after the major aerial assault on Kyiv that hit a children’s hospital.

“We didn’t even expect to have a chance to do a festival while the war is still happening.” Yaremchuk says.

“The reality showed us that cultural events are still possible in wartime.”

Russian drones and missiles struck overnight in Ukraine, killing two civilians and hitting energy facilities and railway infrastructure across the country, officials said on Saturday.

Oleh Syniehubov, regional governor for the Kharkiv region, said Iskander missiles targeted an infrastructure facility in the small town of Barvinkove in the northeast, killing two people and injuring three more.

He gave no details about the facility, but said on the Telegram messaging app that more than 50 residential houses and administrative and commercial buildings were also damaged in the strike.

The Ukrainian air force said Russian forces launched four ballistic Iskander missiles in the overnight attack. The Ukrainian air defence failed to shoot them down.

The air defence shot down 13 of 17 Russian drones over five regions in the east, north, and centre of the country, the air force said.

Ukrenergo, the national grid operator, said the drones attacked electricity distribution facilities in the central Poltava region, in the Sumy region in northeast and in the northern Chernihiv region.

Ukrenergo imposed emergency power cuts for industrial and residential consumers in Poltava and Chernihiv regions, it said on the Telegram messaging app.

Russian forces have stepped up missile and drone attacks on Ukrainian energy infrastructure since March, knocking out about half of the available energy generation and forcing extended blackouts for millions.

The Ukrainian Railways said the overnight attacks damaged railway infrastructure in some parts of Kharkiv region and briefly delayed some passenger trains.

Iryna Farion, a former Ukrainian MP who has become well known for her campaign defending the country’s language, has died in hospital after being shot in the city of Lviv.

The attack on the 60-year-old linguist is being treated as an assassination, Ukraine’s interior minister said, while president Volodymy Zelensky said he was personally across the incident and that such acts of violence must be condemned.

Farion was shot in the street at around 7.30pm on Friday by an unidentified gunman, who fled the scene. She died in hospital later the same day.

Police are hunting the gunman, with Ukraine’s SBU security service also involved in the search.

Farion joined the nationalist Svoboda (Freedom) party in 2005 and was elected as an MP for a single term from 2012.

She campaigned vociferously against public figures and officials who gave addresses in Russian – a common occurrence despite Ukrainian being the only official state language.

In 2018, when Ukraine was already fighting against Russia-backed separatists in the Donbas to the country’s east, she called for members of the public to “punch every Russian-speaking person in the jaw”.

Farion was fired from her role as a professor at the Ukrainian language department at Lviv Polytechnic University after comments last November in which she said Ukrainian soldiers who spoke Russian were not truly Ukrainian. She was reinstated to her role at the university last month.

The Ukrainian president said a Russian missile strike in the southern city of Mykolaiv hit a children’s playground near a residential building.

Three people, including a child and two adults, were killed and five others were injured, officials said.

“A playground near an ordinary house… Every day Russia proves with its terror that pressure on it is not enough,” Volodymyr Zelensky said on Telegram.

He posted images from the site that showed two bodies lying on the ground. One was the badly mutilated body of a child, covered in blood, dust and debris. Part of a missile lay alongside.

The port city of Mykolaiv and the surrounding region regularly come under Russian attacks.

Vitaliy Kim, the regional governor, hailed residents of the city who rushed to the site to help before medics arrived.

Moscow denies targeting civilians or civilian infrastructure in its invasion.

Shortly before he spoke to Donald Trump on the phone on Friday, Volodymyr Zelensky said in a BBC interview that it would be “hard work” for Ukraine if the Republican were to be re-elected as American president.

Amid concerns that a second Trump administration would drastically reduce US support for Ukraine in its war against Russia, Mr Zelensky said that if a “new team” enters the White House “we have to work with them”.

Mr Zelensky agreed that this would be “hard work”, but added: “We aren’t afraid of hard work.”

Asked about Mr Trump’s claim that he could end the war within 24 hours of entering office, Mr Zelensky said Ukraine would be happy for peace but asked about the “cost” involved.

He said a Trump peace plan would likely involve giving up occupied territories to Vladimir Putin, as well as ending all sanctions on Russia.

“We will never go with it, and there is no guy in the world who can push us to do it,” he said.

The Republican leader’s choice of Senator JD Vance as his running mate has underscored how Washington’s stand on Ukraine, locked in a 28-month-old war with Russia, could change if he won the election. Mr Vance is on record in an interview as saying “I don’t really care what happens to Ukraine one way or the other.”

Asked about these comments, Mr Zelensky said: “Maybe he really doesn’t understand what goes on in Ukraine.”

Russian drones hit energy infrastructure facilities in two regions in Ukraine in overnight attacks, officials said.

Ukrainian air defence shot down 13 of 17 Russian drones over five regions in the east, north, and centre of the country, the air force said.

One of the Shahed drones hit an energy facility in the Sumy region while another struck a site in the Chernihiv region, regional officials said.

Repair teams were rushed to the sites of the strikes, they said. There were no immediate reports of casualties.

Russian forces have stepped up missile and drone attacks on Ukrainian energy infrastructure since March, knocking out about half of the available energy generation and forcing extended blackouts for millions.

Volodymyr Zelensky used his historic address to the UK cabinet to urge Sir Keir Starmer to “show leadership” and let Ukraine use British weapons for strikes deep inside Russia.

The Ukrainian president on Friday became the first foreign leader to address the cabinet in person since Bill Clinton in 1997, calling for support with his country’s “long-range capability”.

In his address to the Cabinet Mr Zelensky said “if the restriction on western weapons is lifted” it would help Kyiv to strengthen its defence and secure its frontline positions.

Donald Trump said he had a “very good phone call” with Volodymyr Zelensky on Friday, even as the Biden administration warned about the possibility of the twice-impeached former president withdrawing aid to Ukraine.

“President Zelensky of Ukraine and I had a very good phone call earlier today. He congratulated me on a very successful Republican National Convention and becoming the Republican nominee for President of the United States,” Mr Trump said in a Truth Social post.

“He condemned the heinous assassination attempt last Saturday and remarked about the American people coming together in the spirit of Unity during these times.”

Mr Trump added: “I appreciate President Zelensky for reaching out because I, as your next President of the United States, will bring peace to the world and end the war that has cost so many lives and devastated countless innocent families. Both sides will be able to come together and negotiate a deal that ends the violence and paves a path forward to prosperity.”

Mr Zelensky also confirmed the call but did not mention Russia’s war, a day after he told BBC it will be “hard work” to work with Mr Trump and that maybe he does not understand what is happening in Ukraine.

“I wished him strength and absolute safety in the future,” he said. “I noted the vital bipartisan and bicameral American support for protecting our nation’s freedom and independence.”

Mr Zelensky concluded: “We agreed with President Trump to discuss at a personal meeting what steps can make peace fair and truly lasting.”

Antony Blinken on Friday hinted at the possibility of Mr Trump withdrawing support to Ukraine if he is re-elected.

Ukraine is on its way to being able to “stand on its own feet” militarily, he said Blinken, noting that more than 20 other countries have pledged to maintain their own military and financial aid to the country.

The commander of a Russian unit fighting in Ukraine was shot dead and left “riddled with holes” by his own men, according to a phone call intercepted by Ukraine’s military intelligence (HUR).

“Our commander was killed, a good commander, he took pity on everyone. Eleven bullet wounds,” a soldier told his father in the recording published by HUR on Telegram.

Asked who shot him, the soldier said: “The officers said they shot him, and that was it. No questions. Eleven bullet wounds. He was riddled with holes.”