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U.S. President Donald Trump speaks during a swearing-in ceremony of Special Envoy Steve Witkoff in the Oval Office at the White House in Washington, D.C., U.S., May 6, 2025.

REUTERS/Kent Nishimura/File Photo

What We’re Watching: Trump talks peace, Pakistan charms China, Romania, Poland and Portugal go to the polls

Trump seeks peace between Ukraine and Russia - again

US President Donald Trump will speak Monday at 10 am EST to Russian President Vladimir Putin to discuss “STOPPING THE 'BLOODBATH'” in Russia’s war with Ukraine, as well as “trade.” After that call, Trump will speak with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, in the hopes of brokering a 30-day ceasefire.

But is a deal DOA? Ukrainian sources claim that Moscow insists that Ukrainian troops first withdraw from the Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, Kherson, and Luhansk regions of Ukraine, which doesn’t align with Washington’s proposal. Moscow hasn’t commented, but such demands could torpedo a truce before it begins.

A new eastern axis: Pakistan, China…. and Afghanistan?

Pakistan’s Foreign Minister and deputy Prime Minister, Ishaq Dar, is in Beijing Monday to meet with his Chinese counterpart Wang Yi "on the evolving regional situation in South Asia and its implications for peace and stability.” The meeting follows April’s violent conflict between Pakistan and India which saw Islamabad deploy Chinese weapons.

Is Kabul now in play? While in China, Dar is reportedly also holding trilateral talks with Afghanistan to discuss "enhanced security cooperation". The three countries all border India, and an alliance could threaten that country’s territorial integrity in the north.Pakistan further claims that its ceasefire with India expired Sunday, raising the possibility of renewed hostilities.

A mixed night for the right in trio of European elections

A centrist takes the crown in Romania, the right makes gains in Portugal, and a run-off awaits in Poland.

In Romania, the centrist mayor of Bucharest, Nicușor Dan, bested hard-right election front-runner George Simion 53.8% to 46.2%. The results won’t please the White House, which had plumped for Simion, but will delight the EU, NATO, and Ukraine, which Romania has supported in its war with Russia.

In Portugal, the center-right Democratic Alliance (AD) won 32% of the vote, improving on last year’s results by 4 points and boosting its number of seats in the Assembly to 89. They remain short of an outright majority, though. It was a dismal night for the opposition Socialist Party (PS), which scored just 23% and lost 20 seats, leaving it with just 58. This means that Chega, a hard-right party, will be the joint-second-largest party in Portugal, after it also won 58 seats. This is by far Chega’s best result in its six-year history.

In Poland, liberal Warsaw Mayor Rafal Trzaskowskinarrowly bested conservative historian Karol Nawrocki, 31.4% to 29.5%, in the first round of the presidential election. Trzaskowski would help Prime Minister Donald Tusk reform laws enacted by the former governing party, Law and Justice, while Nawrocki would align with the far right. The two men will now face off in a second-round runoff on June 1.

The Graphic Truth: How NATO absorbed its old foes

For almost half a century, NATO and the Soviet-backed Warsaw Pact alliance glowered at each other from across the Iron Curtain. But after the USSR collapsed, NATO expanded eastward by welcoming former Eastern Bloc members – a development Moscow viewed as a direct challenge to its sphere of influence.

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Russian President Vladimir Putin walks to deliver his annual address to the Federal Assembly in Moscow.

Reuters

What We’re Watching: Putin blames the West, China in Ukraine war, Sunak close to Northern Ireland deal

Putin blames the West … for everything

Russia’s President Vladimir Putin played all the greatest hits Tuesday when he took to the podium for a State of the Union address to Russian legislators and the military just days out from the one-year anniversary of the Ukraine war. In his typically defiant fashion, Putin said that the West “started the war” and warned that Moscow would not back down from its objectives in Ukraine, emphasizing Russian unity on the issue. He also revived the (debunked) justification that the war was crucial to “protect Russia and liquidate the neo-Nazi threat” from Kyiv. Crucially, Putin implied that Russia would break with the New START treaty, which limits Moscow and Washington to deploying 1,550 nuclear weapons a piece, though Russia has reportedly already exceeded that number. Suspending the treaty would also block the US from monitoring compliance. This comes just hours before US President Joe Biden will deliver a speech in Warsaw, where he is expected to again frame the war in Ukraine as a fight for democracy itself.

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Members of of the Armed Forces of Ukraine prepare amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, near Bahmut, Ukraine.

REUTERS/Marko Djurica

What We're Watching: A looming Russian offensive, Biden’s State of the Union, Lasso’s losses

Ukraine prepares for Russian assault amid troubling rumors

The Institute for the Study of War, a military think tank based in Washington, DC, has forecast that Russia will launch a major military offensive in eastern Ukraine in the coming weeks. (Russia remains much less likely to again send troops from Belarus toward Kyiv because Ukrainian troops are now even better armed and positioned in the north than when they routed Russian forces last spring.) Ukrainian intel officials say Vladimir Putin has ordered Russian forces to capture the full territory of Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts by the end of March, and Ukraine’s defense minister has warned that Russian forces may have mobilized a lot more soldiers than has been widely reported in Western media. Preparations for a Russian offensive and a possible Ukrainian counteroffensive come at a tricky moment for Ukraine. Rumors are flying that President Volodymyr Zelensky may replace Defense Minister Oleksii Reznikov following the ministry’s suspected involvement in a corruption scheme involving overpayment for food – though Reznikov has not been personally implicated. We’ll be watching to see what happens next, but Zelensky has not yet publicly addressed the conflicting reports.

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Ukrainian troops in the midst of the conflict to take back control of Kharkiv province from Russian forces.

Reuters

What We’re Watching: Ukraine's gains, Democrats' midterm odds, IMF to offer food aid

Jubilant Ukrainians continue to advance

Ukraine’s military gains of the past few days have emboldened its fighters and leaders. An attack meant to test Russian strength at various points along the front in northeast Kharkiv province became a major counteroffensive when many Russians simply abandoned their equipment and ran. As of Monday, Ukraine has grabbed more territory in five days than the Russian military captured in the past five months. To demonstrate it can still inflict punishment, Russia responded with an artillery blitz aimed at knocking out electricity and water, initially causing widespread outages across Ukraine. But President Volodymyr Zelensky captured the Ukrainian mood on social media with a response aimed at Moscow: “We will be without gas, lights, water and food … and WITHOUT you!” Ukraine’s defense minister has warned his forces to brace for a Russian counterattack, though it appears Russia lacks the manpower and the weapons for an effective near-term military response in Kharkiv province. Russia’s war effort is not collapsing. Its forces remain dug in across much of the Donbas region and along the Black Sea coast. Though Ukraine has seized momentum, this war is far from finished. But Ukrainian forces have again demonstrated that, whatever the Kremlin claims, Putin’s war is not going to plan.

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Reuters

Shortages reach far beyond food

The war in Ukraine is just the latest crisis to befall global supply chains in recent years, and it appears likely to get worse before it finally eases. It’s not just about interrupted flows, shortages, and higher prices for food and fuel. According to a report published in May 2022 by Dun & Bradstreet, a total of at least 615,000 businesses operating globally depend on supplies from either Russia or Ukraine. About 90% of those firms are based in the United States, but supply chains in Europe, China, Canada, Australia, and Brazil are heavily impacted. According to the report, a total of 25 countries have a high dependency on Russia and Ukraine for a variety of commodities.

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Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskiy awards service dog and bomb sniffer "Patron."

Reuters

Hard Numbers: Ukraine's canine hero, IS strikes in Sinai, another kidnapping by Haitian gangs, Havana explosion

200: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has handed out a number of medals to service members fighting against the Russian onslaught. The latest recipient of a war-time accolade? A brave soul named Patron, a petite Jack Russell Terrier and bomb sniffer who has identified more than 200 explosive devices.

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The Graphic Truth: What Ukraine's lost

Russia’s offensive in Ukraine, now in its second month, has wreaked havoc on the Ukrainian people, 9% of whom have been forced to flee the country. Ukraine’s eastern flank has been particularly hard hit. In the besieged city of Mariupol, for instance, 80% of infrastructure has now been destroyed. As the war wages on, and with the death toll well into the thousands, we take a look at the vast damage to infrastructure and the civilian toll.

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