G7 leaders — with Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelensky but without Donald Trump — at their summit in Alberta Canada, June 17, 2025

Tuesday’s Coverage: Russia Murders 10 d+, Injures 114+ in Kyiv

Map: Institute for the Study of War

UPDATE 1350 GMT:

The toll from Russia’s missile and drone attacks on Kyiv early Tuesday has risen to 28 murdered.

Emergency workers recovered more bodies from the rubble of a nine-story apartment block demolished by a Russian missile. Twenty-three of those slain in the capital were inside the building.

UPDATE 1153 GMT:

European Union foreign policy head Kaja Kallas has told the European Parliament that “Russia is already a direct threat”.

Kallas elaborated:

Russia is violating our airspace, conducting provocative military manoeuvres near EU borders, targeting our trains and planes, attacking our pipelines, undersea fibre optic cables and electricity grids, assaulting our industry, including companies supporting Ukraine, and is recruiting criminals to carry out sabotage attacks, and it is steadily building up its military forces and expanding its nuclear arsenal.

She noted, “Last year, Russia spent more on defense than the European Union combined. This year, Russia is spending more on defence than its own healthcare, education and social policy combined.”

Calling out a “long term plan for a long term aggression”, Kallas said, “We have to do more for Ukraine, for our own security too….If we don’t help Ukraine further, we should all start learning Russian.”

UPDATE 1122 GMT:

The Kremlin says North Korea is sending another 5,000 personnel to aid Russia in its invasion of Ukraine.

Sergey Shoygu, the Secretary of the State Security Council, announced the deployment during a visit to Pyongyang.

The North Koreans sent around 12,000 troops last autumn to assist Moscow’s effort to regain the Kursk region in western Russia. The UK Ministry of Defence said this week that they have suffered 6,000 casualties.

Russian media indicated that the new personnel would be put to work in Kursk, part of which was seized by Ukraine in a cross-border offensive last August.

UPDATE 1103 GMT:

Ukrainian officials have raised the toll from Russia’s missile and drone attacks early Tuesday to 18 murdered and 151 wounded.

Sixteen of the fatalities were in Kyiv and two in Odesa in souther Ukraine.

Viktoriia Vovchenko, 57, said of Russia’s levelling of a nine-story residential building in Kyiv’s Solomianskyi district:

I have never seen anything like this before. It is simply horrific. When they started pulling people out, and everyone was cut up, elderly people and children….I do not know how long they can continue to torment us ordinary people.

ORIGINAL ENTRY: Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky has praised “concrete decisions” at the G6+1 summit in Canada, bolstering resistance against Russia’s 40-month invasion.

Late Sunday, Donald Trump bailed out of the gathering in less than 24 hours, avoiding a meeting with Zelensky as well as any discussion and decisions about support of Ukraine. However, the other G7 members — France, Germany, Italy, Canada, Japan, and the UK — pledged further aid as the Kremlin continues to reject a ceasefire and presses its ultimata against Kyiv.

Sitting alongside Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney, Zelensky said, “We need the help of our allies to for our soldiers to stay strong until Russia is ready for peace negotiations.”

He later summarized the outcome of the talks:

The President followed up this morning:

G7 Leaders expressed support for President Trump’s efforts to achieve a just and lasting peace in Ukraine. They recognized that Ukraine has committed to an unconditional ceasefire, and they agreed that Russia must do the same. G7 Leaders are resolute in exploring all options to maximize pressure on Russia, including financial sanctions.

French President Emmanuel Macron chided Vladimir Putin over the latest Russian missile and drone attacks, which murdered at least 18 civilians and wounded at least 151 on Tuesday.

“It shows the complete cynicism of President Putin, who is using the international context to step again attacks against civilians,” Macron told reporters.

But, in another sign of Trump’s unwillingness to back Ukraine as he courts the favor of Putin, the US vetoed a joint statement, claiming that the wording was too anti-Russian and could compromise negotiations.

A Ukrainian official noted:

It is an permanent hazard that Ukraine is a victim of events and Trump’s short attention span. Vladimir Putin knows that, which may be why there was such a large attack in Ukraine last night. There had been all sorts of promises for this summit – including new US arms deliveries being offered.

Needing more air defense amid Russia’s deadly, record-setting strikes, Kyiv had proposed buying systems from the US, getting around Trump’s line that it is exploiting Americans.

Trump’s resistance also blocked the G6+1 from lowering its price cap on Russian oil exports, introduced in December 2022, from $60 per barrel to $45.

Trump snapped on Monday that Europeans should “do it first” and that “sanctions cost us a lot of money, billions and billions of dollars”.