Free Republic

EU energy ministers on Monday backed a proposal to phase out Russian oil and gas imports to the bloc by January 2028, the Council of the European Union said. The ministers approved the plans, which would phase out new Russian gas import contracts from January 2026, existing short-term contracts from June 2026, and long-term contracts in January 2028, at a meeting in Luxembourg. The law is not yet final. EU countries must negotiate the final rules with the European Parliament, which is still debating its position. The EU wants to phase out Russian energy imports to deprive the Kremlin of...

Ukrainian President Zelenskiy’s latest White House visit to secure Tomahawk missiles reportedly devolved into a contentious “shouting match” with President Trump. According to anonymous sources, Trump, fresh off a phone call with Vladimir Putin, made a stunning reversal. He allegedly pressured Zelenskiy to surrender the entire Donbas region, warning that Putin would “destroy” Ukraine otherwise. Trump was said to have cursed, tossed aside battlefield maps, and repeated Russian talking points verbatim, including calling the conflict a “special military operation.”

Ukraine may import gas worth around $2 billion from Europe, the United States, and Azerbaijan this winter, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said, after its gas infrastructure was severely damaged by Russian attacks. He did not specify how much gas Ukraine planned to purchase. Kyiv had expected to import 4.6 billion cubic meters (bcm) of gas before a series of Russian strikes hit Ukraine's gas sector earlier this autumn. Due to the damage, energy minister Svitlana Hrynchuk said imports would need to be increased by 30%, while analysts estimated total gas import requirements at no less than 6.3 bcm. "We expect that...

In an exclusive interview with Meet the Press, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy says that after President Trump’s breakthrough deal in the Middle East, he should take a similar approach with Russian President Vladimir Putin — but with even greater pressure to end the war in Ukraine.

U.S. President Donald Trump pushed Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy to give up swaths of territory to Russia during a tense meeting on Friday that left the Ukrainian delegation disappointed, according to two people briefed on the discussion. Trump also declined to provide Tomahawk missiles for Ukraine's use, and mused about giving security guarantees to both Kyiv and Moscow, comments that the Ukrainian delegation found confusing, added the two sources, who requested anonymity to discuss a private conversation. After his meeting with Zelenskiy, Trump publicly called for a ceasefire on the current frontlines, a position that the Ukrainian president then embraced...

Another meeting between President Donald Trump and President Volodymyr Zelensky has reportedly ended with a fiery shouting match—this time behind closed doors.Trump was pressuring his Ukrainian counterpart to accept Russia’s terms for a ceasefire during an explosive White House meeting on Friday, according to the Financial Times, reportedly telling Zelensky that Russia would “destroy” Ukraine if he didn’t agree.Multiple sources told the outlet that the meeting—where Zelensky was hoping, but ultimately failed, to secure long-range Tomahawk cruise missiles—quickly descended into a “shouting match” with “cursing all the time.”

The American Conservative sits down with Balázs Orbán, political director to the Hungarian Prime Minister, to discuss why the logic of war should be replaced in the forthcoming Budapest summit by the idea of political settlement. (Wikimedia Commons) President Donald Trump recently demonstrated willingness for a summit with Russia, in Budapest, to seek an end to the conflict in Ukraine. Balázs Orbán, political director to the Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán (no relation), sat down with The American Conservative to discuss what are the possibilities of peace in Ukraine, and who in the EU might try to hinder that. Hungary...

Those who think that Israel is guilty of genocide as if that is something unique to the Middle East, are obviously blind to the the entire region of the Balkans and Ukraine. This is the motherland of ethnic cleansing and genocide that the Western Press is paid to ignore. Trying to achieve peace in the Balkans may be more difficult than getting it to snow in Hell. The Balkans’ ethnic tensions stem from a mix of historical, political, and cultural factors that have compounded over centuries. Ukraine may not be in the Balkans and is technically part of Eastern Europe,...

Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa will use talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin to formally request that Moscow hand over Bashar Assad to face trial over alleged crimes against Syrians, two Syrian sources told Reuters on Wednesday. Sharaa, who once headed the Syrian branch of al Qaeda and who toppled predecessor Bashar al-Assad, a close Russian ally, late last year, was speaking at the start of Kremlin talks with Putin on his first visit to Russia since coming to power. Sharaa's visit was sensitive. Russia had used its military muscle to back Assad for years against Syrian rebels, and Moscow granted...

Trump urged Zelenskyy to accept Russia’s terms to end the war, warning that Putin would “destroy” Ukraine if he refused

Last night, on October 19, a series of explosions occurred at the Novokuibyshev Oil Refinery in Russia’s Samara Region following a drone attack. Drones also struck a gas processing plant in the Russian city of Orenburg. According to eyewitnesses, black smoke rose above the Novokuibyshev refinery after the attack, and videos shared on social media show heavy smoke over the facility. Regional Governor Vyacheslav Fedorishchev confirmed the UAV attack but did not disclose details regarding the damage. The Novokuibyshev refinery, owned by Rosneft, is one of the key enterprises in the Samara Region, with a capacity to process up to...

Donald Trump’s lead negotiator has been pushing Volodymyr Zelensky to hand over the entire Donetsk region to Russia in order to end the war in Ukraine, it has emerged.Steve Witkoff, who has met with Vladimir Putin, the Russian president, five times this year, told the Ukrainian delegation visiting the White House last Friday to surrender the territory its forces control.It is one of the key demands made by Putin, who made clear in a phone call with Mr Trump last week that he still wants Ukraine to give up the stretch of land as a precondition for peace, The Washington...

In his video address, Zelensky said that Ukraine will not make any concessions to Russia, emphasizing that "nothing will be given as a gift" and that Kyiv will continue to defend its territory and sovereignty. "In the recent Trump-Putin phone call, Russian President Putin demanded Ukraine surrender the rest of the Donetsk and Lugansk regions, in exchange Moscow will drop claims for the remaining Kherson and Zaporozhye regions," - The Washington Post.

Leaked Russian defense industry documents reveal an ambitious 10-year plan to rebuild Moscow’s tank fleet, aiming to produce over 2,600 new and modernized tanks between 2026 and 2036. This challenges previous, lower Western estimates of Russia’s industrial capacity. The plan prioritizes mass production of the T-90M, including a new T-90M2 variant, and the extensive modernization of older T-72s.

The Russian leader noted that the reaction of Western elites on a new interpretation of events was primitive and straightforwardMOSCOW, October 17. /TASS/. Western elites spent years teaching Russia about the importance of freedom of speech and competition, and now they are trying to ban and block all of that, President Vladimir Putin said in a speech marking the 20th anniversary of RT. "For years, they [Western elites] taught us how to live, how the media should work, how to understand democracy and what democracy is. What true freedom of speech is. They convinced us of the importance of competition,...

Russian Gasoline Prices

The Russian Defense Ministry said on Wednesday that its troops had pushed Ukrainian forces out of two settlements. It said Russian forces had taken control of the village of Oleksiivka in Ukraine's Dnipropetrovsk region as well as the settlement of Novopavlivka in the Donetsk region.

They are part of Russia's broader targeting of infrastructure that now is being carried out with greater precision thanks to advances in long-range drone technology that include onboard video feed. In the attack in Shostka, less than 70 kilometers (43 miles) from the Russian border, two explosives-laden drones struck two commuter trains in quick succession. Russia has stepped up railway attacks over the past three months, seeking to sow unrest in Ukrainian regions it borders by depriving people there of rail connections, Oleksandr Pertsovskyi, the CEO of the Ukrainian state railway, told The Associated Press. “What happens is not just...

United States Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth said “firepower” is coming to Ukraine through European nations’ purchases of US weapons, but whether that includes American-made Tomahawk missiles is still not clear. “Firepower, that’s what is coming,” said Hegseth, backing up comments from NATO chief Mark Rutte as the security alliance’s defense ministers gathered in Brussels. He added that “commitments” made by European nations would soon turn into “capabilities” for Ukraine.The weapons purchases are being made under the new Prioritized Ukraine Requirements List (PURL) initiative, which has already seen $2 billion pledged for military equipment for Ukraine, with more expected to...

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy revoked the citizenship of Odesa mayor Hennadiy Trukhanov on Tuesday, which Ukraine's security service said was due to Trukhanov also being a Russian citizen. Trukhanov denied having Russian citizenship and said he would take his case to court. Ukraine prohibits its citizens from holding Russian citizenship, and Trukhanov - mayor of Ukraine's biggest port city since 2014 - has been dogged by allegations of dual nationality throughout his political career. "I now have evidence that I could not, either physically or legally, obtain Russian citizenship or passports," Trukhanov told public broadcaster Suspilne. Ukraine's SBU security service...