Russia-Ukraine war live: Sunak tells Zelenskiy UK will train pilots but supplying fighter jets to Kyiv is not ‘straightforward’

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Here are some of the latest images to be sent to us from Ukraine over the news wires, including from areas occupied by Russia.

Russia‘s defence ministry has claimed for the first time today that it had downed a long-range Storm Shadow missile supplied to Ukraine by Britain, which announced last week that it was providing them, Reuters reports.

The ministry said in its daily briefing on the Ukraine conflict that it had shot down the cruise missile, as well as shorter-range US-built Himars-launcher and HARM missiles. The claims have not been independently verified.

Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said earlier on Monday that Russia viewed Britain’s decision to supply the missiles “extremely negatively”.

Ukraine says it has already used the longer range missiles to strike at targets deeper within Russian-occupied regions of Ukraine.

Here is a recap of events earlier today, when Ukraine’s president made an unannounced visit to the UK:

Britain promised the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, long-range attack drones when he visited the country today as part of a European tour aimed at securing new weapons for a counteroffensive against Russia.

Zelenskiy met prime minister Rishi Sunak at the British leader’s Chequers country residence, where the pair also discussed Ukraine’s request for western fighter jets.

Britain said it would begin basic training of Ukrainian pilots this summer “hand in hand with UK efforts to work with other countries on providing F-16 jets”.

Sunak said Britain would provide Ukraine with hundreds of air defence missiles and further unmanned aerial systems, including new long-range attack drones with a range of more than 200km, to be delivered over the coming months. It remains unclear exactly what type of drones the announcement referred to.

Sunak’s spokesperson confirmed again that Britain had no plans to send fighter jets directly to Ukraine.

The Ukrainians made the decision to train their pilots on F-16s and you will know the RAF don’t use those,” he said.

In response, the Kremlin said Russia takes an “extremely negative” view of Britain’s decision to supply Ukraine with more military hardware but does not believe London’s help will change the course of the conflict.

Sunak said:

The conflict is at a pivotal moment. The UK will remain steadfast in supporting Ukraine and its people to defend itself … it is important for the Kremlin to also know that we are not going away. We are here for the long term.

Andrew Roth, the Guardian’s Moscow correspondent, reports:

Yevgeny Prigozhin, the self-acknowledged founder of the Russian paramilitary army Wagner, has tried to laugh off a report published in the Washington Post that claimed he had offered to reveal Russian military positions to Ukrainian intelligence if Kyiv pulled its troops back from the battlefield city of Bakhmut.

Yet the rate and tone of his denials as of Monday afternoon could indicate that the Russian warlord is getting nervous about being regarded as a traitor.

The explosive report was based on information from the Discord leaks and was corroborated by intelligence sources, the Washington Post said. [See 6.10 BST]

“They could have put more effort into it and [falsified] some telephone screenshots,” Prigozhin said on Monday of the reporting, which suggested he had held direct meetings with officers from Ukraine’s military intelligence (HUR) in Africa.

In another statement, he claimed he hadn’t been in Africa since before the beginning of the conflict and blamed his enemies for “pouring shit on me”, suggesting it could be “people from Rublyovka”, an expensive area just outside Moscow, meaning his enemies could be in the Russian establishment.

For Prigozhin, it would be an obvious act of treason to suggest revealing Russian military positions. The bloodthirsty businessman with ties to Vladimir Putin has grown more erratic in recent weeks, as he has engaged in a growing conflict with the Russian military and defence minister Sergei Shoigu, whom he has accused of depriving his men of artillery shells.

But directly collaborating with the enemy would be a big escalation on Prigozhin’s part and one that he would know would leave him vulnerable to his enemies inside Russia and abroad.

He also has a long track record in Russia of trolling and toying with his enemies, helping found bot farms, fake newspapers and the now-notorious paramilitary group that he is said to bankroll.

Tatiana Stanovaya, the founder of the R.Politik analysis firm, wrote that she “did not believe” that Prigozhin was an open traitor. She, like other analysts, suggested that even if contacts with Ukrainian military intelligence were confirmed, that would not directly imply that he was betraying the Kremlin.

First, Prigozhin’s “‘Betrayal’ could be a special task – to lead a counteroffensive into a trap”, she wrote on Monday. “2. Betrayal would be very beneficial to Prigozhin’s enemies inside and outside Russia.”

Jennifer Rankin reports from Brussels

The EU is ready to enforce sanctions against foreign companies helping Russia evade trade restrictions, the head of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, has reiterated.

The EU’s 27 member states are discussing plans to blacklist several Chinese companies for their role in supplying Russia with goods banned under western sanctions. The proposal is part of a wider set of measures to clamp down on countries in the Caucasus, Central Asia and Middle East believed to be helping Russia dodge western sanctions.

Some EU member states, led by Germany, the EU’s export powerhouse, fear that targeting China and other non-EU countries could drive them closer into an alliance with Russia.

Asked about this at a press conference, Von der Leyen did not respond directly, or name specific countries, but doubled down on the commission’s approach.

She said:

[The EU proposal was] basically a warning that we’re serious about our sanctions, that we could ban these goods from going to a third country, if there is clear evidence that this is a circumvention of time of sanctions and [there are] deliveries to Russia”.

Von der Leyen, with EU council president Charles Michel, will represent the EU at an upcoming Council of Europe summit in Reykjavik and a G7 gathering in Hiroshima.

Ahead of these events, she said countries had a duty to show “the same level of stamina, perseverance” that she had witnessed from Ukrainians on a visit to Kyiv last week.

Leaders should rally behind two main principles, Von der Leyen said:

One is that we will keep supporting Ukraine for as long as it takes and the second principle is nothing about Ukraine without Ukraine. As long as it takes must translate basically into stable financial support, of course also beyond 2023, and accelerated military support focused on the now and here. And nothing about Ukraine without Ukraine means very strong support for President Zelenskiy‘s peace formula.

Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, on Monday lauded “important and powerful” military aid from Britain, France and Germany, and said he was pleased with agreements reached during a tour of Europe, Reuters reports.

Zelenskiy said:

The priority [during our talks] was our counteroffensive actions, I am very pleased with the achievements and agreements.

Nato’s secretary general has said he expects the alliance to agree a “multi-year programme” to assist Ukraine in its desire to join the organisation, and that there was no “meaning in discussing when and how Ukraine can become a member of the alliance” unless it prevails in the war “as a sovereign independent nation in Europe”.

At the Copenhagen democracy summit, Jens Stoltenberg was being interviewed by one of his predecessor at the helm of Nato, Anders Fogh Rasmussen. He said

Nato allies will, when they meet in July, the heads of state and government, they will send a very clear message of support to Ukraine, and this will be manifested in many different ways.

When it comes to membership. I expect that Nato allies will say that Ukraine will become a member of the alliance. This has been stated several times.

Ukraine has the right to choose his own path. It is not for Moscow to decide what Ukraine can do, it is for Ukraine. And it is for Nato allies to decide on the issue of membership … and of course those the Nato’s door remains open.

I also expect that we will agree a multi-year programme for Ukraine where we will work on how to help Ukraine transition from Soviet-era standards, doctrines and equipment to Nato standard doctrines and equipment, and to become fully interoperable with Nato. And of course, to do that also helps them to move towards Nato membership.

I also strongly believe that all allies will state that of course, the most urgent task now, is to ensure that Ukraine prevails. That President Putin do not does not win this war.

Because it is only if Ukraine prevails as a sovereign independent nation in Europe, that there is any meaning in discussing when and how Ukraine can become a member of the alliance.

Britain has no plans to send fighter jets to Ukraine after the Ukrainian military indicated it would prefer to use F-16 fighter jets, the UK’s prime minister Rishi Sunak‘s spokesperson said on Monday, Reuters reports.

Asked if Britain would send fighter jets to Ukraine, the spokesperson said:

There are no plans to do that. The Ukrainians made the decision to train their pilots on F-16s and you will know the RAF don’t use those.

On Twitter, the head of the Ukrainan president’s office, Andriy Yermak, said he is with Volodymyr Zelenskiy in the UK, working on “strengthening defence support”.

In a tweet, he said:

Today in ?? together with the president Volodymyr Zelenskiy.

Our team is working on strengthening defence support and Euro-Atlantic integration.

And we understand that we don’t have time for certain issues to “ride” – they must “fly”.

The UK’s prime minister, Rishi Sunak, has said the UK will be ready to help train Ukrainian pilots to use western fighter jets “relatively soon” but says it is “not a straightforward thing”, PA reports.

Speaking after his talk with the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, at Chequers, Sunak said:

We are going to be a key part of the coalition of countries that provides that support to Volodymyr and Ukraine.

It is not a straightforward thing as Volodymyr and I have been discussing to build up that fighter combat aircraft capability.

It’s not just the provision of planes, it is also the training of pilots and all the logistics that go alongside that, and the UK can play a big part in that.

One thing we will be doing starting actually relatively soon is training of Ukrainian pilots and that’s something we’ve discussed today and we’re ready to implement those plans in relatively short order.

Russia takes an “extremely negative” view of Britain‘s decision to supply Ukraine with more military hardware such as long-range attack drones, but does not believe it will change the course of the conflict, Reuters reports.

Asked about Britain’s military aid, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said:

We take an extremely negative view of this. Britain is trying to be one of the leading countries which keeps pumping weapons into Ukraine.

It cannot have any significant or major impact on the course of the special military operation,” he said, using the phrase the Kremlin uses to describe Russia’s military invasion of Ukraine.

“But it all leads to more destruction, to further military action and so on. So for Ukraine, it makes things much more complex.”

Earlier, Rishi Sunak noted that today’s meeting with Volodymyr Zelenskiy at the prime minister’s country estate of Chequers was taking place in the buildup to a Council of Europe leaders’ meeting in Iceland and a G7 summit in Japan later this week.

“The frontlines of Putin’s war of aggression may be in Ukraine but the fault lines stretch all over the world,” Sunak said.

Zelenskiy told broadcasters after the meeting that the supply of jets was crucial to Ukraine.

“Today we spoke about the jets. Very important topic for us because we can’t control the sky,” he said, adding that Ukraine and the UK were “real partners,” with Sunak being informed of details of developments on the battlefield.

UK’s prime minister, Rishi Sunak, has said he discussed “long-term” security arrangements from allied countries for Ukraine to protect itself against “future Russian aggression” in his meeting with the country’s leader, PA reports.

Speaking to broadcasters after his talk with Volodymyr Zelenskiy at Chequers, the prime minister said:

Another topic of conversation we’ve had today is about the security arrangements we should put in place among allied countries for Ukraine for the long term to ensure it can defend itself and provide effective deterrence against future Russian aggression.

Volodymyr Zelenskiy has said that he discussed “a coalition of jets” in discussions with the British prime minister at Chequers today.

“I see that in the closest time, you will hear some, I think, very important decisions but we have to work a little bit more on it,” he said after a meeting with Sunak.

Earlier the UK government said “This summer we will commence an elementary flying phase for cohorts of Ukrainian pilots to learn basic training. This will adapt the programme used by UK pilots to provide Ukrainians with piloting skills they can apply a different kind of aircraft. This training goes hand in hand with UK efforts to work with other countries on providing F16 jets – Ukraine’s fighter jets of choice.”

However, so far London has been reluctant to directly supply modern jet fighters, arguing that it is logistically difficult to put them into operation in Ukraine.

The UK has issued another picture of Volodymyr Zelenskiy and Rishi Sunak together at Chequers earlier today.