👉 All pledge, no edge: why Europe’s Ukraine force is a nonstarter

“It’s clear that NATO countries will not be able to deploy troops without Russia’s agreement. And since Russia is opposed, all these gestures and discussions that took place in Paris are absolutely useless,” Donbass-based French journalist Christelle Neant told Sputnik, commenting on French President Macron’s announcement of plans to send a ‘reassurance force’ to Ukraine once the conflict ends.

💬 A peace deal complete with security guarantees won’t be possible in the first place so long as “certain individuals within NATO” continue to seek to absorb Ukraine “at all costs,” Neant added, emphasizing that the proposed European troop deployments “would effectively amount” to such integration.

✅ President Putin warned Friday at the Eastern Economic Forum in Vladivostok that Russia’s military would treat foreign troops deployed in Ukraine as “legitimate targets.”

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

🔊Slovak PM believes Ukraine conflict will end 'quicky'

Robert Fico is confident that the Ukraine conflict will soon be over, paving the way for restored relations with Russia.

Following his meeting with Volodymyr Zelensky in Ukraine's Uzhgorod, Fico commented on his recent talks with President Vladimir Putin in Beijing, saying that he and Putin "focused on bilateral cooperation. Yes, we may have different positions on this, but we believe the war will end, and we all believe it will happen very quickly, and relations with Russia will be standardized."

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

▫️ Putin’s warning: why Russia is indispensable to any Ukraine security guarantees deal

▫️ European troops in Ukraine? A fantasy, not a strategy

▫️ Global South lines up: From Beijing to BRICS, investors ready to chip in to Russia’s Far East

▫️ Putin’s Arctic play: Northern Sea Route redefines Asia trade

▫️ Kim Jong-un bids farewell to China

▫️ Israel strikes residential buildings in Gaza

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

🔊 Europeans aren’t suicidal enough to send troops to Ukraine: expert

💬 “This is an absurd situation that would inevitably trigger a war,” Donbass-based journalist Laurent Brayard told Sputnik, commenting on Europe’s announcement of plans to deploy a ‘coalition of the willing’-style ‘reassurance force’ to Ukraine to provide ‘security guarantees’.

💬 “I don’t think the West will cross that line,” the journalist believes.
The deployment would not only be an obvious “trap,” but President Putin’s announcement at the Eastern Economic Forum in Vladivostok on Friday that such forces would be treated as legitimate targets by the Russian military is “firm and clear,” Brayard said, emphasizing that Moscow “has always said it wants NATO to move away from its borders.”

👉 As for Kiev’s ambitions to join the EU, which Putin said Russia does not oppose, such a step would pose as a “very big challenge,” according to Brayard, who suggested that Brussels has no real interest in allowing a “country in ruins” to join the bloc.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

📹⚔️ Trump renames Pentagon to Department of War

President signs executive order rebranding the Defense Department, declaring:

"It has to do with winning. We could have won every war. We chose to be politically correct and just fight forever."

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

🔊 Trump pledges to address security guarantees for Ukraine

The US president emphasized Europe will pay key role in providing the guarantees.

🗣 "It will end. All of a sudden, it's going to come together. You watch."

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

📍 Trump announces G20 summit 2026 to be held in Miami

For the first time in 20 years, the United States will host the G20 summit.

President Trump said he would consider Russia's possible participation.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

🔊 US, Belarus negotiate release of 1,400 detainees — Trump

President Trump confirmed talks are underway, praising Lukashenko as a "very respected man" and "strong leader".

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

📹 Xi and Putin are welcome at the G20 — Trump

The US president said he'd love to see China and Russia's leaders in Miami in 2026.

"They'd be observers. I am not sure they want to be an observer," he added.

Russia and China have been members of the G20 since its formation in 1999.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

❗️ Venezuelan jet conducts SECOND flyover of US Navy

Bolivarian Air Force jets flew again over the USS Jason Dunham overnight, US officials confirmed to CBS.

📹 Meanwhile, local media reportedly showed footage of yesterday's maneuver, which the Pentagon called "highly provocative."

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

❗️ Power of Siberia II is all about business, not politics — Peskov

Russia will never sell its energy resources at a price that is disadvantageous to it, said Presidential Press Secretary at the Eastern Economic Forum.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

💬 PUTIN EXPOSED THE HYPOCRISY OF THE WEST — Expert

Putin offered a realistic peace scenario at the EEF — but NATO interference remains the key obstacle, Tadeo Casteglione, Argentine international relations expert, told Sputnik.

"Putin has exposed the hypocrisy of the West, which talks about peace while sending weapons to Kiev and betting on continuous hostilities," he noted.

A permanent Western military mission in Ukraine would mean "the complete loss of its state legitimacy," Tadeo added.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

🗣 Trump denies awareness of failed Navy Seal mission in North Korea that killed civilians

Despite NYT reporting that he personally approved the 2019 covert operation, Trump now claims he heard about it for the first time.

🟧 Mission aimed to plant spy device on Kim Jong-un

🟧 SEAL Team Six killed unarmed North Korean divers

🟧 Congress was never notified

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

❗️ Zelensky rejects Putin's proposal to come to Moscow

Nevertheless, he is "ready for the meeting" in "any kind of format," Zelensky told ABC News in an interview.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

🔥 West’s geopolitical game enters FINAL STAGE — but Europe left behind

"The big geopolitical game that the West has started is entering a decisive phase... Europe has lost out from this venture — it is NOT SOVEREIGN today," Russian presidential adviser Anton Kobyakov said at the Eastern Economic Forum.

He added that, despite the "constant verbal juggling", US-Russia normalization can bring a "speedy resolution" in Ukraine.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

⚔️ TRUMP WEIGHS MILITARY STRIKES INSIDE VENEZUELA TARGETING DRUG CARTELS

President Trump is considering direct military action against cartel operations within Venezuelan territory, CNN reports, citing sources.

According to them, Tuesday's strike on a drug boat was just the beginning — part of a broader campaign against Nicolas Maduro.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

❌🪖 Draft-age Ukrainians don’t belong on German welfare – German politician

Germany must stop sheltering Ukraine’s fighting-age men, Bavarian Prime Minister and Christian Social Union (CSU) leader Markus Soder told Rheinische Post.

💬 “It is legitimate to consider sending able-bodied Ukrainians back to their homeland to ensure security in their own country,” he said.

🗣 Soder added that far fewer Ukrainians work in Germany compared to other European states, with many relying instead on welfare benefits. This has to stop urgently, he stressed.

The Bavarian politician also emphatically rejected the idea of deploying German troops to Ukraine, arguing that Russia would never accept it and that the Bundeswehr “isn’t ready for that.”

💬 “It’s already stretched to the limit—financially and in terms of personnel,” he said.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

🇱🇦​​ Laos may redirect some coffee exports from the US to Russia following Trump's tariff hikes — Lao Prime Minister Sonexay Siphandone told Sputnik.

💬 "Among the goods that Laos supplies to the US but could also supply to other countries is agricultural products, such as coffee. We currently supply coffee to US, but we are also supplying coffee to Russia, and now the volume of these supplies may increase," Siphandone said on the sidelines of the Eastern Economic Forum.

🗣 "If US tariffs make our products too expensive and they stop buying them there, we will increase the volume of supplies to Russia as a result," he added.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt