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Starmer hopes his China trip will begin the thaw after recent ice age

The last British prime minister to visit China was Theresa May in 2018. Before the visit, she and her team were advised to get dressed under the covers because of the risk of hidden cameras having been placed in their hotel rooms to record compromising material. Keir Starmer, in Beijing this week, was more sanguine about his privacy, even though the security risks have, if anything, increased since the former Tory prime minister was in town. China has been accused of spying on parliament, has sanctioned British MPs and peers, engaged in severe cyber-attacks, adopted aggressive trade practices and generally been, in the government’s own words, an “epoch-defining challenge”. “I can confirm that I didn’t,” Starmer replied to whether he had taken refuge while getting dressed. “I’ve always said that we need to seize the opportunities, mindful of our national security.” The prime minister’s instincts are indicative of his broader approach to balancing the risks on this trip – one of the most significant of his time in office. After years of what Starmer has described as the “ice age” in relations between the UK and China, it was intended to begin the thaw. But for all the potential offered by closer ties with the world’s second-biggest economy for a country desperate for growth, Beijing does not open the doors for nothing. While officials stress there was no political involvement, the UK’s decision to green-light the new Chinese mega-embassy in London smoothed the way. After that, Starmer was given the full works: ceremonial welcome, military march-past, lavish banquet, praise from his host and, crucially , more than three hours of talks with President Xi Jinping. The prime minister appeared to be getting into the spirit. When Xi’s business secretary greeted him with a deep bow, Starmer looked quizzically at Peter Kyle, his British counterpart. Kyle managed a polite nod. While there were some tangible gains from the trip – a visa waiver, cuts to whisky tariffs, investment in China by British firms – it was the 10 different agreements signed that will really make the difference. One British official described them as “jam tomorrow” deals. But the Chinese state is such a bureaucratic monolith that unless the man at the top is signed up, British businesses will struggle to get access to the market. So while some back home may have asked “was that it?”, in No 10’s view what mattered was the turning up – and a “more sophisticated” future relationship. “This trip is just the start,” Kyle told a reception at the British embassy on Thursday night. But a more sophisticated relationship means not just cosying up to China for the sake of our domestic economy – and ending up in a second “golden age” despite Beijing’s aggression. Before the trip, the prime minister promised he would raise “issues that need to be raised” – including the fate of pro-democracy activist Jimmy Lai and the persecuted Uyghur community. He did raise them, but whether that will have any effect has yet to be seen. There was one clear breakthrough: China lifted its sanctions on six serving British parliamentarians. While Starmer will be leaving China for the next leg of his trip on Saturday, he will feel that it is job done. Of course, deepening bilateral relations does not happen in a vacuum, as Donald Trump reminded the UK with his usual bluntness. Starmer’s attempts were “very dangerous”, he warned. It is the US president’s unreliability, however, that encourages “middle powers” such as Britain, France and Canada to consider their options. China spies an opportunity. But the biggest challenge for the prime minister waits back at home. While he is at his most comfortable – and some say most effective – on the international stage, it is not lost on his team that he is seen as the very opposite in the UK. While leadership speculation has abated while he has been out of the country, it has not gone away. When he returns to Westminster on Monday, his many political and policy problems await him. He has had a confidence boost in China, and is more intent than ever to keep calm and carry on. But he may not get long to do so. On Wednesday afternoon, as the British Airways plane carrying Starmer and his delegation began its descent into Beijing, a familiar voice came over the cabin’s public address system. It was the prime minister. “Sit back, enjoy the rest of the flight – I’ll be bringing the plane in from here,” he joked. It remains unclear whether he’ll be able to deliver a safe landing at home.

‘It’s like a gift from God’: undocumented foreign workers welcome Spanish amnesty

Not everyone has been enthused by the Spanish government’s decision this week to buck European political trends by announcing plans to regularise 500,000 undocumented migrants and asylum seekers to boost “economic growth and social cohesion”. Alberto Núñez Feijóo, the leader of the conservative People’s party (PP), described the move as a reward for “illegality” that would bring more people into the country and “overwhelm our public services”. Santiago Abascal, who leads the far-right Vox party, attacked the measure as a nefarious effort to facilitate an “invasion” designed to replace Spaniards with foreigners. But for the young Bangladeshi man sitting in a cramped NGO office in central Madrid on a rainy Thursday, the announcement was nothing short of a miracle. For him, the decree raises the prospect of a future that need not be spent pounding the streets and selling cheap umbrellas in all weather to earn between €200 (£173) and €400 a month. “I don’t have my papers so I can’t get a proper job,” said the man, who came to Spain 14 months ago and asked not to be named. “I really worry about paying my rent and I’m also trying to support my wife and daughter, who I left behind. I can’t get public housing or go to the doctor. I’m out on the street all day in the rain and the cold and the sun, just trying to earn a living.” That, he added, was why he had been so delighted by Tuesday’s announcement. “I’m so excited,” he said. “It’s like a gift from God that will help keep me going.” Sitting next to him, Mohammed Elahi Alam Alam, the president of the Valiente Bangla Association, which works to help undocumented migrants, also welcomed the decision by the ruling Spanish Socialist Workers’ party (PSOE), saying it was long overdue recognition of reality. It was also a necessary counter to Vox’s stated intention of deporting 8 million people of foreign origin, including their Spanish-born children. “There are people who don’t want immigrants here – the fascists – but who’s going to work in the fields?” Alam asked. “Immigrants. Who’s going to work in the restaurants? Immigrants. Who’s going to look after people’s families? Immigrants.” Evidence of Valiente Bangla’s multi-faceted outreach work crammed Alam’s office: sacks of potatoes for communal, charitable meals; megaphones; children’s toys; and a stack of Spanish language books. Many of those eligible for regularisation, however, will not need to work on their Spanish. Rosa (not her real name), who came to Spain from her home country of Colombia almost two years ago, is one of the huge number of Latin American women who work informally as cleaners, cooks and carers. Many are badly paid and some are mistreated by their employers. Rosa said: “A lot of us have sacrificed so much to come here in search of a better life and yet some days you get up and think: ‘I just can’t do this any longer – I’m going to go back.’ “Some people deliberately hire undocumented people because they know they won’t need to pay them what they should or cover their social security.” For Rosa, the regularisation programme is the chance to get a job that pays more than €120 a week, and to access the protections and benefits enjoyed by legal workers. Despite the shrill political opposition to regularisation, it is far from unprecedented in Spain; PP and socialist governments enacted similar programmes between 1986 and 2005. Research suggests such initiatives can yield economic benefits for newly legalised workers and for government coffers. Joan Monràs, one of the authors of a study into the 2005 regularisation of almost 600,000 non-EU immigrants, said tax revenues increased by about €4,000 per regularised immigrant a year, adding that the policy had not led to “magnet effects” in encouraging further arrivals. “The first part of the paper looked at whether there was a ‘pull effect’ or not and we concluded that there wasn’t … there was no relative change in the flow of migrants,” said the labour economist. “Something else we saw very clearly was that the career paths of immigrants who entered the social security system improved significantly. A good example of this was domestic workers who entered the labour market. After starting off working for families, within six months, they’d started working for larger companies and earning higher salaries.” The decree is also not the first time the administration of Pedro Sánchez has defended the moral and economic case for immigration as Spain struggles with an ageing population and low birthrate. He said in October 2024: “Throughout history, migration has been one of the great drivers of the development of nations while hatred and xenophobia have been – and continue to be – the greatest destroyer of nations. The key is in managing it well.” But his government’s words and policies have infuriated the far right in Spain and beyond, and fake news stories about the regularisation have proliferated on social media. Although the measure will confer official resident status on successful applicants, it will not give them citizenship and the accompanying right to vote in general elections. On X this week, Elon Musk reposted a claim that Sánchez was using the move to conduct “electoral engineering” adding: “Wow.” Sánchez reposted the SpaceX tycoon’s comment with a reply of his own: “Mars can wait. Humanity can’t.” Amid the squabbling and point-scoring, some of those who have spent years campaigning for regularisation have called for reflection about what the decree means and why it is needed. Catholic groups, including the migration department of the Spanish conference of bishops, see the measure as “an act of social justice and recognition of so many migrants who, through their work, have long contributed to the development of our country, even at the cost of keeping them in an irregular situation”. Edith Espínola, a spokesperson for the Regularisation Now! movement, said the decree would go a long way to restoring the rights that so many people had lost when they crossed borders in search of safety or a better life. “Regularisation makes you feel like a citizen and a person,” she said. “It stops you feeling like an object and it lets you fight for your rights. You know those rights are yours but they’re never really yours until you have a plastic card that says you’re a resident of this country.” Regularisation, she added, allowed people to work, study and live with dignity. “It means that you can break through that invisible border. It means you can feel a little bit more human from the moment that you have that plastic card.”

Ukraine war briefing: Zelenskyy fears rising US-Iran tensions will scupper key peace talks in UAE

Rising tensions over possible US strikes on Iran have injected fresh uncertainty into the plans for senior Ukrainian and Russian officials to meet in Abu Dhabi this weekend for another round of talks. “The date or the location may change,” Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy said. “From our point of view, something is happening in the situation between the United States and Iran, and those developments could affect the timing.” “It is very important for us that everyone we agreed with be present at the meeting, because everyone is expecting feedback,” Zelenskyy told reporters in remarks released by his office on Friday. The US secretary of state, Marco Rubio, had said on Wednesday that President Donald Trump’s top envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, who attended the previous round of talks, would not participate in the weekend meeting in Abu Dhabi. In Moscow, two sources told Reuters that Kirill Dmitriev, Putin’s special envoy, would travel to Miami on Saturday for meetings with members of Trump’s administration. Ahead of the possible talks, there has been a notable reduction in attacks by Russia and Ukraine against each other as Ukraine continues to experience one of its coldest winters in decades, with many people living without electricity and heating. The Ukrainian capital is bracing for an especially cold spell from Sunday, with temperatures forecast to fall as low as -26C. Zelenskyy said he was waiting to see if Russia would observe a proposed pause in strikes on Ukrainian cities and energy infrastructure, saying on Friday there was no formal ceasefire agreement between Ukraine and Russia, Pjotr Sauer writes. But Zelenskyy said Kyiv would halt such strikes if Moscow did the same. Donald Trump on Thursday claimed that Vladimir Putin had agreed to halt strikes on Ukraine’s energy infrastructure for a week. The Kremlin has acknowledged the request but declined to say whether the Russian president had agreed to it. Spokesperson Dmitry Peskov indicated the measure would end on Sunday. Zelenskky noted on Friday that in all regions, “there were indeed no strikes on energy facilities from Thursday night to Friday”. “Ukraine is ready in reciprocal terms to refrain from strikes and today we did not strike at Russian energy facilities,” he said. Incoming Dutch prime minister Rob Jetten – whose D66 party struck a minority coalition deal to form a government this week – said he opposed the suggestion by some European Union leaders that the EU should reopen diplomatic channels with Russia so that Donald Trump could not set the tone for talks with Moscow. Jetten pledged that his new government would continue to support Kyiv and said he would not speak to Moscow because there were currently “no indications” Russia wanted to end the war in Ukraine. “And as long as the aggression continues, we will continue our support for the Ukrainian people.” He also said Europeans should have “a much stronger debate about what can Europe do for itself,” and stop looking at the US under Trump. Meanwhile, Hungary’s prime minister Viktor Orbán has stepped up his opposition to Ukraine joining the EU, claiming the bloc was looking to admit the country in 2027 to help it benefit from the next seven-year financial budget. His comments come after Zelenskyy repeated his target to join the EU in 2027, despite some scepticism in the bloc about the accelerated process that would be required. Orbán’s comments will probably be seen as part of an increasingly fierce campaign ahead of this April’s critical parliamentary election in Hungary, which could see him ousted after 16 years in office.

Trump says he believes Iran wants to make deal as he extols size of US ‘armada’

Donald Trump has said he believes Tehran wants to make a deal to head off a regional conflict, as he claimed the US “armada” near Iran was bigger than the taskforce deployed to topple Venezuela’s leader. “We have a large armada, flotilla, call it whatever you want, heading toward Iran right now, even larger than what we had in Venezuela,” the US president told reporters on Friday. “Hopefully we’ll make a deal. If we do make a deal, that’s good. If we don’t make a deal, we’ll see what happens.” He declined to say whether he planned a repeat of the military operation in Venezuela in which US forces captured and renditioned the president, Nicolás Maduro. “I don’t want to talk about anything having to do with what I’m doing militarily,” he said. His comments came after Iran’s foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi said Tehran was ready to negotiate with the US, but only if talks were not under duress and did not extend to Iran’s missile programme. After meetings with Turkish diplomats, Araghchi said Iran was “ready to begin negotiations if they take place on an equal footing, based on mutual interests and mutual respect”. He said there were no immediate plans to meet US officials, adding: “I want to state firmly that Iran’s defensive and missile capabilities will never be subject to negotiation.” Araghchi said: “The Islamic Republic of Iran, just as it is ready for negotiations, is also ready for war.” Trump said on Thursday he hoped to avoid military action, even as the US deployed another warship to the Middle East, joining the USS Abraham Lincoln and several guided-missile destroyers. But his precise objectives remain unclear. Speaking at the premiere of the documentary Melania, the US president told reporters Iran had to do “two things” to avoid military action. “Number one, no nuclear. And number two, stop killing protesters,” saying that “they are killing them by the thousands”. He added: “We have a lot of very big, very powerful ships sailing to Iran right now, and it would be great if we didn’t have to use them.” Iran has blamed the US and Israel for the protests that erupted in late December over economic grievances, and were brutally suppressed. Activist groups estimate as many as 30,000 people were killed in the ensuing crackdown. On Saturday, the Iranian president, Masoud Pezeshkian, said Trump, Benjamin Netanyahu and Europe had stirred tensions in the protests and “provoked” people. The Turkish foreign minister, Hakan Fidan, said the resumption of talks between Tehran and Washington over Iran’s nuclear programme was “vital for reducing regional tensions”. Speaking alongside Araghchi, he claimed Israel was pushing for the US to attack Iran, and urged Washington to “act with common sense and not allow this to happen”. In a call with Iran’s president, Masoud Pezeshkian, Turkey’s president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, said he was willing to act as a mediator between Iran and the US. From Iran’s perspective, the US is piling ever more demands on Tehran that if all were implemented would spell the end of its sovereignty. Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff has called for an end to Iran’s nuclear enrichment programme, the transfer of its existing stock of highly enriched uranium out of the country, limits on Iran’s missile programme and an end to support for proxy groups in countries such as Lebanon, Iraq and Yemen. Araghchi held separate phone calls with his counterparts from Qatar, Egypt, the United Arab Emirates, Oman and Turkey. All the Arab states have insisted their air ground facilities cannot be used by the US to attack Iran. In Turkey, Araghchi criticised Thursday’s decision by the EU, likely to be followed by the UK, to proscribe the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) as a terrorist organisation. He said: “The truth is that Europe is a declining continent and has lost its role on the international level and is losing it more and more every day, and it is surprising that they themselves are fuelling this process. This shows that Europe has neither a correct understanding of the international situation, nor a correct understanding of the conditions in our region, nor a correct understanding of its own interests. The decision they made was a major strategic mistake.” Araghchi did not spell out what reprisals were being considered, but the UK Foreign Office has always worried such a move would lead Iran to break off diplomatic relations. But Ali Larijani, the secretary of Iran’s national security council, said in future Tehran would treat the armies of Europe as terrorists. The Iranian supreme leader’s representative in the IRGC said the European action would have serious consequences for the EU. On Friday, the US followed the EU in imposing sanctions against Iran’s interior minister, accusing Eskandar Momeni of repressing the nationwide protests. The sanctions come as anger grows inside Iran that the supposedly reformist government allowed such large-scale killings. In a statement, the Reform Front, a reformist umbrella body, called for “an independent fact-finding committee to investigate this unprecedented disaster and present a transparent and candid report to the Iranian nation”. It also called on the judiciary to refrain from “hasty rulings” against detainees, and said bereaved families must be allowed to freely mourn protesters who were killed in the crackdown.

Mexico president says Trump tariffs on Cuba’s oil suppliers could trigger humanitarian crisis

Mexico’s president, Claudia Sheinbaum, has warned that Donald Trump’s move to slap new tariffs on countries sending oil to Cuba could trigger a humanitarian crisis on the island, which is already suffering from chronic fuel shortages and regular blackouts. The US president signed an executive order on Thursday declaring a national emergency and laying the groundwork for such tariffs, ratcheting up the pressure to topple the communist government in Havana. A White House statement cited the Cuban government’s alleged ties to Russia, Hamas and Hezbollah to explain the new tariffs. While the statement did not name Mexico, Sheinbaum’s government has been the top supplier of oil to the island since 2025, surpassing Russia and Venezuela. Sheinbaum said on Friday that her government would seek more information about the tariffs from the US state department, while looking for alternative ways to provide humanitarian aid to the Cuban people. “We will seek a way, without putting Mexico at risk, of course, but always seeking solidarity with the Cuban people,” she told reporters. The new tariff policy comes as Cuba struggles with increasingly severe blackouts. Sheinbaum said the tariffs could “directly affect hospitals, food supplies and other basic services for the Cuban people”. Cuba’s president, Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermúdez, said in a post on X that Trump sought to “suffocate” the island’s economy and that the tariffs revealed the “fascist, criminal, and genocidal nature of a clique that has hijacked the interests of the American people for purely personal gain”. Cuba’s situation has become even more precarious since the US captured and transported Nicolás Maduro, a key ally of the government in Havana, from Venezuela at the start of the year. A week later, Trump wrote in a Truth Social post: “THERE WILL BE NO MORE OIL OR MONEY GOING TO CUBA – ZERO!” On Thursday, the Financial Times reported an estimate that Cuba only has enough oil to last 15 to 20 days at current levels of demand and domestic production, and could soon face sharp rationing. Sheinbaum’s comments came after a week of increasing threats from Washington. US officials briefed that gunboats could be deployed off Cuba, and said efforts were under way to find Cuban ministers prepared to collaborate with the US. Speaking on Wednesday, Mike Hammer, the US chargé d’affaires in Havana, said: “The Cubans have complained for years about a ‘blockade’, but now there is going to be a real blockade.” The issue of oil shipments to Cuba is a fraught one for Sheinbaum, who is striving to show the Trump administration that Mexico is a partner on trade and security without alienating the left wing of her party, Morena. The Trump administration has recently repeated its threats of unilateral military strikes on drug-trafficking cartels in Mexico, just as the two countries begin to renegotiate the trillion-dollar USMCA North American free trade agreement. In Havana, 12-hour daily blackouts have become commonplace. Many Cuban families are struggling to cook food, finding it hard to get hold of gas canisters, and are resorting to cooking over charcoal. But Jorge Piñon, an expert on Cuba’s energy at the University of Texas, said the situation has the potential to grow even more severe. “If we do not see any crude oil or fuel deliveries within the next six to eight weeks, then the government will have a major crisis on their hands,” he said.

Israel accepts health authorities’ Gaza death toll is broadly accurate, saying 70,000 have died

Israel’s military has accepted the death toll compiled by health authorities in Gaza is broadly accurate, marking a U-turn after years of official attacks on the data. A senior security official briefed Israeli journalists, saying about 70,000 Palestinians had been killed by Israeli attacks on the territory since October 2023, excluding those missing. It is the first time Israel has publicly estimated the toll from the war in Gaza. Previously the government and military had only provided figures for militants Israel claimed to have killed. Gaza health authorities said the direct toll from Israeli attacks had exceeded 71,660 people, with at least 10,000 presumed buried in the rubble of bombed buildings. For more than two years, Israeli officials and media had attacked the Palestinian figures as “Hamas propaganda” and dismissed them as “not accurate”. The abrupt shift in stance raises broader questions about Israel’s defence of its campaign in Gaza. A UN commission, rights groups and scholars have accused Israel of committing genocide in the territory. “What other accusations could turn out to be true?” the Israeli newspaper Haaretz said after the briefing. “The Israeli public must ask itself what this belated recognition indicates about the army and the government’s credibility regarding Israel’s conduct in Gaza.” It is also likely to intensify scrutiny of civilian casualties in Gaza. The Israeli military previously claimed to have killed 22,000 militants in Gaza, suggesting that, by its own count, more than two-thirds of the 70,000 dead were non-combatants. That figure is significantly below the 83% civilian toll indicated by a classified Israeli military database, but well above the 50% casualty rate previously claimed by Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu. Israel was still reviewing how many of the dead were civilians, the Times of Israel said, but believed the overall toll compiled by Gaza health authorities was “largely accurate”. A military spokesperson declined to confirm or deny the figure given at the briefing, saying only that “the details published do not reflect official IDF data”. The Palestinian database does not provide a breakdown of fighters and non-combatants. It does identify most of the dead by name, date of birth and Israeli-issued identity numbers. Israeli attacks on Gaza health authorities ignored a long track record of reliable record-keeping. During past wars in Gaza the final toll recognised by Israel and observers including the UN was broadly in line with Palestinian data. There was little coverage or discussion of the death toll in Israeli media. Most major outlets attended the briefing, but with the exception of Haaretz, initially ignored the new figure. Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper quoted the figure in a report focused on diplomatic manoeuvring between the US, Qatar and Israel. The report quoted an official, saying: “Our estimate is that roughly 70,000 Gazans were killed in the war, not including missing persons.” The paper’s online outlet, Ynet, later published a short piece on the toll late on Thursday evening. It was not a headline on television news shows. The Israeli military also said it would open the key Rafah crossing between Gaza and Egypt on Sunday, for the first time since Israeli forces seized control of the border area nearly two years ago, in May 2024. Palestinians who left Gaza could now apply to return for the first time since the war began, a spokesperson said. A European Union force would supervise the crossing, but Israel would retain full control of everyone who entered and left, the spokesperson said. Reopening Rafah has been presented as a central part of US efforts to push Donald Trump’s ceasefire plan for the territory firmly into a second stage. It will only be open to pedestrians, so will not ease shortages of food and shelter aid, medicine and other basic humanitarian goods in Gaza.

Islamic State claims attack on international airport and airbase in Niger

Islamic State in the Sahel has claimed responsibility for an audacious assault at the international airport and adjacent air force base in Niamey, the capital of Niger, according to the SITE Intelligence Group, which tracks jihadist activity and communications worldwide. The attack, which began shortly after midnight on Thursday, reportedly involved motorcycle-riding militants who launched a “surprise and coordinated” strike using heavy weaponry and drones, according to statements released via IS in the Sahel’s propaganda arm, Amaq news agency. The regional IS affiliate has been linked to high-profile attacks in Niger in recent months, killing more than 120 people in strikes targeting the Tillabéri region in September, and abducting an American pilot in October. The gunfire and explosions in the airport, which is about 6 miles (10km) from the presidential palace and Base Aérienne 101, a military base previously used by US and then Russian troops, hit at least three planes: one belonging to Ivorian carrier Air Côte d’Ivoire and two belonging to the Togolese airline Asky. A source at Asky said the airline staff were in their hotel away from the scene and remained in the city, with their passports still in the custody of the authorities. Niger, which has been led by a junta since the deposition of the democratically elected Mohamed Bazoum in July 2023, has previously blamed the chaos on its neighbours Benin and Côte d’Ivoire, as well as former colonial ruler France, without presenting any supporting evidence. In a statement aimed at Niger’s neighbours in the regional Economic Community of West African States and its former ally France, the head of the junta, Gen Abdourahmane Tchiani, said on national television on Thursday: “We have heard them bark, they should be ready to hear us roar.” Since the coup, Niger has exited Ecowas, joining ranks with fellow junta-run states Burkina Faso and Mali to form the Association of Sahel States (AES), which has issued its own passports and set up a regional development institution, the Confederal Bank for Investment and Development. AES sees some of its Ecowas neighbours as French proxies scheming along with Paris to derail development in the Sahel states as they grapple with jihadist activity. In its statement on Thursday, Nigerien authorities said the attackers arrived on motorcycles, and security forces quickly repelled their advance, killing 20 of the attackers and arresting 11 others. A stash of ammunition also caught fire, the government said. The Niamey attack happened about the same time as an attack using drones by jihadists in neighbouring Nigeria. The attack by Islamic State West Africa Province in the early hours of Thursday at the Sabon Gari army base in the north-east state of Borno left at least nine soldiers dead and several others wounded.

Hungary doubles down on opposition to Ukraine’s EU accession as Zelenskyy aims for 2027 – as it happened

… and on that note, it’s a wrap for today! Hungary’s prime minister Viktor Orbán has stepped up his opposition to Ukraine joining the European Union, claiming the bloc was looking to admit the wartorn country in 2027 to help it benefit from the next seven-year financial budget (13:26). His comments come after Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelenskyy repeated his target to join the EU in 2027, despite some scepticism in the bloc about the accelerated process that would be required (9:58). Orbán’s comments will likely be seen as part of an increasingly fierce campaign ahead of this April’s critical parliamentary election in Hungary, which could see him ousted after 16 years in office (13:55). Separately, Ukraine’s Zelenskyy has said there were no Russian strikes on energy infrastructure overnight, after US president Donald Trump claimed he discussed a form of brief ceasefire with the Russian president, Vladimir Putin (10:37, 12:13). The Kremlin confirmed that Putin received a “personal request” from Trump on this issue, without clarifying what his answer was (11:26). The exchange comes as there is a growing question mark over whether this weekend’s trilateral talks between Ukraine, Russia and the US will even take place amid growing tensions between the US and Iran (10:11). And that’s all from me, Jakub Krupa, for today. If you have any tips, comments or suggestions, email me at jakub.krupa@theguardian.com. I am also on Bluesky at @jakubkrupa.bsky.social and on X at @jakubkrupa.