EUROPE - European and Nato leaders chose moral grandstanding over diplomacy, and now they’re being sidelined. Sir Keir Starmer and the leaders of Europe have agreed to stand united. Defying Vladimir Putin’s bloody imperialism, they will back to the hilt Volodymyr Zelensky’s insistence that he will not trade land for peace. Except there is one small problem. Instead of presenting their ironclad unity to the Kremlin, they’ll be doing so to Donald Trump, urging him to impose further sanctions on Russia and not to cave to more of Putin’s demands. But when it comes to actual talks with Putin himself, they are not even in the room.

UKRAINE - EU diplomats are pleased to see tentative support for security guarantees, even if six hours of talks failed to produce little else. So, a sigh of relief from the European contingent departing Washington. It all went so much better than many had feared. Donald Trump was good-humoured and avuncular, the Europeans flattering and upbeat. Volodymyr Zelensky came across as witty, deferential and relentlessly grateful.

UKRAINE - In tone, this meeting between Donald Trump and Volodymyr Zelensky was a considerable improvement on February’s. In substantive content, a great deal remains unclear. The two fundamental questions of this conflict remain unresolved: where will the borders between Russia and Ukraine lie when Moscow’s terrible war of aggression ends, and how can Kyiv’s and Europe’s security be guaranteed in the future? Everything else is of secondary importance. Russia continues to assert belligerent claims to territory including some still held by Ukraine, with Vladimir Putin insistent that the whole of Donetsk and Luhansk be ceded despite the failure of his forces to make progress. Mr Zelensky has correctly stated that the constitution of Ukraine forbids any such formal concessions of land without a referendum. Mr Trump has hinted that he may prefer to follow “the current line of contact”. The tragic reality is that some territorial concessions on Kyiv’s part are now effectively deemed a given, including in Europe. The only question is how much, where, and the legal status of the lost land.

SPAIN - Emergency services battle week-long infernos in Zamora, Leon and Extremadura. Spain has endured the worst fire season on record, with devastating blazes continuing to destroy homes and land across the country. In all, some 373,000 hectares (922,000 acres) have been scorched in Spain this year, according to the European Forest Fire Information System. That area is twice the size of London. It marks the country’s worst fire season since records began in 2006, surpassing 2022 when 306,000 hectares were consumed by flames. Spain has faced a scorching 16-day heatwave which has led to more than 1,100 deaths, according to an estimate released on Tuesday by the Carlos III Health Institute.

CHINA - China’s foreign minister has begun a visit to India as Beijing seeks to capitalise on its neighbour’s rift with Washington to build a stronger Asian alliance. Wang Yi is making his first visit to Delhi for three years, during which time the Biden administration in the US made great efforts to draw India further into the West’s orbit as a ­fellow democracy. China prefers to see India as a member of the “global south” and it is using shared grievances against the US in the developing world to forge ­informal and formal alliances. “China and India are both major ­developing countries and important members of the global south,” Lin Jian, a Chinese foreign ministry spokesman, said before the trip. “A co-operative pas de deux of the dragon and the elephant as partners helping each other succeed is the right choice for both sides.”

USA - Donald Trump has sparked fresh health concerns after confessing he's worried about not getting into heaven, leading to speculation that "he knows he's dying". The president disclosed on Tuesday that he hopes negotiating peace between Ukraine and Russia will improve his odds of passing through the pearly gates. "I want to try to get to heaven if possible, I'm hearing that I'm not doing well," Trump told Fox and Friends just a day after welcoming European leaders, including Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky, to the White House. The 79-year-old's worries about the afterlife rapidly went viral as social media users theorized that the president's anxieties could be connected to his current health. One person posted on X: "Think of all the reasons an old man that spent his life nips deep in the Seven Deadly Sins would suddenly get desperate for absolution. And then ignore all of them except one: he knows he's dying".

VATICAN - Pope Leo has called on Catholics worldwide to dedicate Friday as a day of prayer and fasting for peace in Ukraine and the Holy Land, while also preparing for what is expected to be his first trip abroad as pontiff — a visit to Lebanon later this year. The Vatican announced that the pope’s appeal for prayer is meant to unite the global Church in a time of ongoing violence and instability. “Prayer and fasting are weapons of peace,” Pope Leo said in remarks urging Catholics to intercede for an end to hostilities.

EUROPE - Bundestag Vice President Omid Nouripour said on Tuesday on the n-tv programme “Frühstart” that Ursula von der Leyen was made to leave the room during Trump’s meeting with European leaders in Washington. “In the middle of yesterday’s meeting … Ms von der Leyen had to leave because the Americans said: ‘We only want to talk to leaders.’” According to Nouripour, the EU Commission President was kicked out of the room because the American politicians do not regard her as an elected head of a state. Ursula isn’t a leader. No one elected her though she does manage to cause a lot of trouble in Europe. She was invited by Ukrainian President Zelensky. President Trump invited the heads of state, not the globalist bureaucrat Ursula.

EUROPE - Europe To spend $100 billion it doesn't have, to buy weapons America doesn't have, to arm soldiers Ukraine now lacks. Part of Zelensky's motive for wearing a suit Monday to the White House has become clearer with fresh reporting in the Financial Times, which reviewed a document showing Ukraine will promise to buy $100 billion of American weapons financed by Europe in a bid to obtain robust US security guarantees. Additionally, "Under the proposals, Kyiv and Washington would also strike a $50 billion deal to produce drones with Ukrainian companies that have pioneered the technology since Russia’s full-scale invasion in 2022," the report continues. Ukraine pitched its plan during the Monday White House summit, which also involved seven EU leaders - and the $100 BILLION arms deal became part of the key talking points pushed by the European allies.

UK - A spate of sexual assaults near asylum hotels has pushed the issue of migrant crime onto the national agenda. The coverage of traditional broadcasters towards this issue has shown that some in the media class are not willing to engage in a proper discussion of the risks associated with open borders, in a move that could destroy the last vestiges of public trust in the BBC, Sky News and ITN. The few politicians and commentators actually prepared to tell the British public what is happening in our country have faced a barrage of pushback from self-styled “data journalists”, who no longer see facts as something worthy of reporting, but instead as an inconvenience to their worldview.

UK - It is often noted when people watch replays of the 1966 World Cup Final that England’s fans waved the Union flag, not the Cross of St George. The latter did not really appear at football matches until the European championships in 1996 when Scotland qualified. Scots fans brought the Saltire with them so England responded with the flag of St George.

USA - Earlier this month, we led a delegation to Brussels and London to see how aggressive European speech regulations affect American free speech rights in the digital town square. What we saw shocked us. In August 2024, during our investigation, Mark Zuckerberg, the CEO of Meta, admitted to the Committee that “senior officials from the Biden administration, including the White House, repeatedly pressured our teams for months to censor certain Covid-19 content, including humour and satire”. Zuckerberg acknowledged that “the government pressure was wrong”. Most importantly, Zuckerberg committed to not doing so again, and Meta made policy changes that promoted free speech on the company’s platforms, including Facebook and Instagram.

USA - A celebrated all-vegan restaurant in New York has shocked customers by announcing it will reintroduce meat and fish to the menu four years after removing them. Daniel Humm, the chef-partner of the Manhattan three Michelin-star restaurant Eleven Madison Park, took to Instagram to share the news. He explained that the new menu incorporating animal products “embraces choice”. “I need to create an environment where everyone feels welcome around the table,” he wrote.

UK - Over the past couple of weeks, several political commentators have been declaring that the anxiety about crime in Britain is overdone. Some think it right-wing scaremongering. They challenge the idea that anyone should be perturbed by London’s crime levels. The Times’s own Fraser Nelson has pointed out that Britain’s overall crime rate has been declining for 30 years, with homicides, violent crime and burglaries in particular seeing steep falls. He argues that Britain has never been safer.

SYRIA - Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa is in a difficult predicament: he wants complete control over all of Syria but has lost the trust of the minorities. The regime in Damascus is now on a collision course with all the country’s minorities. While the Alawites are defenseless, the Druze are backed by Israel, and the Kurds constitute a large, armed force that still enjoys a kind of American patronage. In recent days, the regime in Damascus has been publishing lists of detainees, alleged lawbreakers, who participated in the massacre against the Alawites and Druze. But it is doubtful whether these arrests will restore trust in the regime. From the perspective of the minorities, Sharaa’s security forces controlling their territories is frightening and threatening. Syria’s regime is in real danger of crumbling.