German Chancellor Olavi Scholz is confident that he and US President-elect Donald Trump will be able to develop a “joint strategy” for Ukraine. after speaking to him on the phone, he said in an interview published on Saturday. “I am confident that we can develop a common plan for Ukraine. My guiding principle remains that nothing can be decided without the Ukrainian people saying,” Scholz Funke told the media. He added that he spoke with the future US president “in detail” and his team in direct contact with the security department “What is important is that the killing ends quickly and the freedom and power of Ukraine is guaranteed,” he said.
But Scholz again ordered that long-range Taurus missiles aimed at Ukraine, which were made in Germany, were sought in Kyiv. Weapons that could hit targets in Russia would “avoid” escalation, Scholz, who was briefed on the election, said in an interview. Friedrich Merz, the leader of the conservative opposition, who is going to push Scholz into the race, said that Germany should send the missiles to the Tauris.
Russian attacks on the cities of Zaporizhzhia and Kryvyi Rih in south-eastern Ukraine on Friday killed at least 12 people and wounded more than 40, regional officials said. The strike at an auto repair shop in Zaporizhzhia turned the facility into a giant fireball and killed 10 people, the regional governor said. Media quoted a local official as saying that 20 people were injured, including two children. In Kryvyi Rih, a missile fired into an administrative building killed two people. At least 19 others, including a child, were injured in emergency services, with additional residential houses also damaged.
Volodymyr Zelenskyy pushed Russia and its president, Vladimir Putin, over two attacks. “Thousands of such strikes have been carried out by Russia in this war, so it is clear that Putin does not need real peace,” Zelensky said in a Telegram post. “We can resist this only by force. And only by force can true peace be established.”
The Ukrainian president could use his trip to Paris on Saturday to hold talks with Trump, diplomatic sources told Reuters. He had tried to arrange a meeting between Zelenskyy and the incoming US president, who would both attend to restore the church of the Cathedral of Notre Dame. The plans would probably not come together until the last minute and any talks would be discreet, the sources added. The Ukrainian embassy met in Washington on Wednesday with Trump’s choice for White House National Security Advisor, Mike Waltz, and his Ukrainian ambassador, Keith Kellogg.
The European Union needs a “big bang” in spending and policy changes to shore up its defenses against the Russian threat, the new defense chief, Andrius Kubilius, said. “We need to move from the so-called incremental improvement of our defense capabilities to some kind of big bang approach,” the Lithuanian prime minister said, stressing Europe’s need to spend an additional €500bn ($530bn) on defense over the next decade.
Kubilius stated that the real reason to enter Europe is the threat of Putin, not the incoming US president. Trump threatened Washington’s commitment to help protect its allies in Europe and cast doubt on maintaining support for Ukraine. But Kubilius said that European industry was necessary to be able to sustain a “long-term war”.
Russia could deploy a new Oreshnik medium-range hypersonic missile in Belarus next year., Putin said after the Russian president signed a mutual defense pact with his Belarusian counterpart Alexander Lukashenko, at the Minsk summit. “I think this will be possible in the second half of next year, in order to increase the serial production of these systems in Russia and when these missiles enter service with the Russian strategic forces,” Putin said. Russia fired on the Ukrainian city of Oreshnik last month in what Putin described as the first test of the weapon in combat conditions.