G7 leaders urge ‘additional support to close Ukraine’s remaining budget gap for 2024’
Opening summary
Hello and welcome to our live coverage of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
The leaders of G7 countries have pledged support for Ukraine and new sanctions on Russia after a virtual meeting Saturday on the second anniversary of Moscow’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, which ranks as the deadliest conflict in Europe since World War Two.
After the meeting, the G7 leaders didn’t make any public statement about further military aid, but urged “the approval of additional support to close Ukraine’s remaining budget gap for 2024”.
Meanwhile, Ukraine’s military says it has shot down 16 out of 18 drone attacks over eight regions across central, western and southern Ukraine, including the capital region, Kyiv’s military said on Sunday on the Telegram messaging app, Reuters reports.
More on those stories shortly. In other news:
The leaders of G7 countries also demanded after the virtual meeting on Saturday that Russia “fully clarify the circumstances” around the death of opposition leader Alexei Navalny, after the most prominent critic of Russian president Vladimir Putin died in an Arctic prison last week.
Volodymyr Zelenskiy welcomed western leaders to Kyiv on the anniversary, declaring that Vladimir Putin “must lose absolutely everything”. Four western leaders, including the prime ministers of Italy, Canada, and Belgium, arrived in Kyiv on Saturday to show solidarity with Ukraine on the second anniversary of the war.
Italy’s Giorgia Meloni, Canada’s Justin Trudeau, Belgium’s Alexander De Croo and the president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, travelled to the Ukrainian capital together overnight by train from neighbouring Poland, the Italian government said in a statement, Reuters reported.
Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Saturday he had signed a bilateral security agreement with Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau in Kyiv.
