Closing summary
… and on that note, it’s a wrap!
At least 25 people were killed and around 100 injured in Russian attacks on Ukraine overnight, just hours after US president Donald Trump said he was setting a new deadline for Russia to make progress towards ending the war or face new sanctions (9:44, 10:39).
In their first public reaction to Trump’s words, the Kremlin spokesperson said Russia “has taken note” of Trump’s comments, but its “special military operation” in Ukraine will continue (12:03).
Most senior aide to Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Russia chose to continue its invasion, “masking it as protecting its interests” as he urged the US to ramp up pressure on Moscow (13:50).
Separately, Zelenskyy urged the Ukrainian parliament to fast-track the adoption of his revamped law on anti-corruption agencies as part of the country’s EU path (15:55) after the bloc withheld some payments in the latest tranche of aid criticising slow reforms (18:00).
Meanwhile, the Ukrainian army will now allow people over 60 to join on short-term one-year contracts to serve in non-combat roles, after a new law changing the rules was adopted today (17:23).
Elsewhere,
US commerce secretary Howard Lutnick celebrated the new EU-US trade deal as Donald Trump’s “masterclass” in negotiations, despite criticism from some European countries, most notably France (15:36).
Lutnick also said that the rules of pharmaceuticals were “key” to understanding why the EU agreed to a deal with the US, despite the industry’s criticism of the deal.
The EU’s trade spokesperson accepted the deal was “not perfect” for either side, but defended it as “giving us platform for moving forward” (12:37).
But there was a “gulf in understanding” on some of the finer details of the deal, including on whether it covered any part of the EU’s regulatory and tax rulebooks for tech (16:34).
And that’s all from me, Jakub Krupa, for today.
If you have any tips, comments or suggestions, email me at jakub.krupa@theguardian.com.
I am also on Bluesky at @jakubkrupa.bsky.social and on X at @jakubkrupa.
Updated
Ukraine to get reduced EU aid payment over delays in implementing reforms
The EU is set to make a reduced aid payment to Ukraine from its war-time fund for the first time, after Kyiv failed to fulfil all required reforms, AFP reported.
The European Commission has proposed paying Kyiv just over €3bn instead of €4.5bn originally foreseen in a latest instalment of aid, spokesman Guillaume Mercier said.
AFP explained that change comes after Ukraine admitted in June that it had missed three of 16 reform benchmarks, including concerning the appointment of judges to an anti-graft court.
The reduction in the aid payment was already envisioned before Ukraine’s authorities in July caused uproar by passing a law to remove the independence of two anti-corruption bodies, it added.
Ukraine allows over-60s into short-term non-combat roles
Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelenskyy signed a law allowing Ukrainian people over 60 to join the armed forces, which are struggling to find recruits as the Russian invasion drags through a fourth year, AFP reported.
The law will allow them to sign a one-year contract for non-combat roles if they pass medical tests, according to an explanatory note on the parliament’s website.
“A significant number of citizens aged 60 and over have expressed a strong desire to voluntarily join the defence of the state,” the note said.
AFP explained that Ukraine has launched several initiatives to attract more people into the armed forces – including with a one-year contract and financial incentives for people aged 18 to 24.
It also lowered the mobilisation age from 27 to 25 in April 2024 – resisting calls from the US administration to lower it to 18.
'Gulf in understanding' between EU, US on finer details of deal, including digital - snap analysis
in Brussels
A gulf in understanding between the EU and the US on what was agreed on Donald Trump’s golf course has been opened up less than 48 hours after the US president and European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen shook hands.
US commerce secretary Howard Lutnick hit the US airwaves to declare the deal was a “sensational” victory over the EU and a “masterclass” in the art of the deal (15:36).
But some of the details he shared with CNBC, and referred to on the White House text of deal, are not part of the EU’s understanding of what is on the table before tariffs are expected to come in on Friday.
Lutnick repeated the White House claim that the EU had agreed it would “not adopt or maintain network usage fees” or a digital tax.
Inferring digitals services were part of the deal, he told CNBC:
“They [the EU] called me this morning to talk about … what are other things to talk about: digital services, taxes, and the attack on our tech companies, that is going to be on the table. It wasn’t on the table today.”
Earlier in the day Brussels had made clear that digital regulation was not on the table. To underline the point, there was no mention of “digital” in the EU’s version of Sunday’s deal.
Taxing tech was one of the big weapons the EU were considering in the event of a trade war with officials repeatedly telling reporters it had the right to decide its own laws.
The EU reiterated its right to regulate on digital services coming in from the US and that there is no subjugation of digital services in Sunday’s deal.
The bloc’s trade spokesperson said:
“We are not moving on our right to regulate autonomously in the digital space.
The White House statement says that we’ve confirmed that we would not adopt or maintain network usage fees and that we will maintain zero customs duties on electronic transmissions.
That’s correct, but that doesn’t impinge on our rules or our regulatory space ...
I will repeat, we don’t change our rules. We are not moving on our right to regulate autonomously in the digital space.”
Updated
Zelenskyy talks with Denmark's Frederiksen on EU ambitions, anti-corruption reform
Over in Ukraine, president Volodymyr Zelenskyy spoke with the Danish prime minister, Mette Frederiksen, discussing the country’s ambition to join the bloc and the plan to progress the process during Denmark’s presidency in the EU until the end of the year.
In an update on Telegram, he said “we need to make the most of this time to implement all the necessary decisions.”
“For our part, we are doing everything to fulfil our obligations to the EU,” he stressed.
Mentioning in passing the recent controversy around the anti-corruption agencies reform, he said that a new bill “which guarantees the independence” of these authorities is now in parliament.
“I am grateful to Denmark for its support. We agreed that the parliament should vote on this bill urgently, this week,” he said.
EU-US trade deal 'masterclass by Trump' with more 'horse trading still to do,' US commerce secretary says
US commerce secretary Howard Lutnick has been talking about the US perspective on the EU-US deal on CNBC in the last half hour – and he didn’t even try to hide his sense of triumph.
He said:
The president knew how far he could go, and he went exactly that far. The thing about our president is he’s got that intuitive nature, when he’s sitting across the table and making a deal, he knows how far he can push it.
I mean, imagine they committed to $750bn of energy purchase, natural gas and oil and nuclear during his term; they committed $600bn of companies investing in America, and then 15% tariffs, they will pay 15% pretty much across the board.
And we, of course, have an open market to the 20 trillion, $20 trillion European market – it’s five times bigger than any other, you know, Japan, and India, five times bigger - with 450 million people.
It was a masterclass by president Trump, I think.
He said that “the key to why the Europeans did the deal is autos and pharmaceuticals,” dismissing the French criticism of the deal.
Remember, we are the payer of the world, right? All pharmaceuticals, they all make their money by selling to America, and President Trump has been very, very clear, if you’re going to sell here, you’re going to produce here.
And so the Europeans got in front of that freight train and said, we’ll pay you 15% for that, but we don’t want you to rip all of our companies out of Europe, and move them to America.
So, while the French have got a lot to say they were able to protect Sanofi … staying in France, because if they didn’t do this deal, Sanofi would become an American company.
Asked about some of the finer detail – including on the investment promises he mentioned earlier – he explainer:
Well, historically, these kind of agreements would take a decade, and they, of course, wouldn’t come to fruition, right? … . President Trump works on a different time frame and on a different clock.
He wants to get things done now, and he uses the power of the American economy to get things done.
Now, so, pharmaceuticals was key. It was important for them to have pharmaceuticals be part of the deal at 15%.
Because President Trump is going to come out in the next two weeks with this pharmaceutical policy, and it is going to be higher.
Basically, if you are not building your plant in America where we pay for pharmaceuticals, you are going to pay a massive tariff because why should we pay for your drugs.
He added the same logic applied to the automotive industry:
They wanted to get ahead of cars, because 25% on autos means, as you’ve heard Donald Trump say it, you’re going to build your cars in America.
No one can afford to export and pay a 25% tariff, so the Europeans found the highest level that they could survive with, because President Trump would not have cut it otherwise, and they … get keep their autos there.
…
So I think when time, when we talk about it, in a year, you’ll see the Europeans are satisfied with it, because when they see the full Donald Trump policy, which they understood, they knew this was the important deal for them.
And of course it was sensational for Donald Trump, because it proves that everything he said about tariffs is absolutely true.
Asked if the negotiations are over or whether they could still be extended to cover Big Tech and tax issues, Lutnick said:
“Yeah, they called me this morning to talk about … what are other things to talk about: digital services, taxes, and the attack on our tech companies, that is going to be on the table. It wasn’t on the table today.
There are other things that they would like, like steel and aluminium were not included in this deal, that will be on the table.
There’s plenty of horse trading still to do.”
Abramovich business associate Eugene Shvidler fails to overturn UK sanctions
A business associate of the oligarch Roman Abramovich has failed to overturn sanctions imposed on him after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, after a supreme court judgment seen as a test case for the UK’s sanctions regime.
Eugene Shvidler served on the board of companies owned by the former owner of Chelsea football club and now lives in the US. He was placed under sanctions by the UK government in March 2022 as part of measures to target Russia-linked oligarchs and officials after Vladimir Putin ordered the invasion of Ukraine.
Shvidler, who was born in the USSR in 1964, grew up in Moscow but is now a British citizen, had challenged his designation at the high court in 2023 and then appealed against that decision last year. He argued the measures caused disproportionate hardship and discriminated against him as a Russian-born person, while also claiming he was not closely associated enough to Abramovich to justify the Foreign Office’s move.
On Tuesday, a majority decision of four supreme court justices to one dismissed the businessman’s appeal, saying that sanctions had to be tough to be effective.
The judgment stated: “Sanctions often have to be severe and open-ended if they are to be effective. The object of the designation in relation to Mr Shvidler is that he should so far as possible be disabled from enjoying his assets and pursuing his wealthy lifestyle.”
Kyiv hopes Trump's tough words will be followed up with action
Here is the latest on the overnight attacks from our corrrespondent, Shaun Walker in Kyiv.
Russian airstrikes on Ukraine killed 22 people overnight, said the president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, and injured another 85, a day after Donald Trump said he was setting a new deadline of “10 or 12 days” for Russia to make progress towards ending the war.
The worst death toll was at a prison facility in the town of Bilenke in the frontline region of Zaporizhzhia, which appeared to have taken a direct hit from a guided air bomb. Local authorities said 17 people died and dozens sustained injuries. A hospital in the city of Kamianske in the Dnipropetrovsk region was also hit, killing three people including a 23-year-old pregnant woman, Zelenskyy said.
…
In Kyiv, there is hope that the new tough words from Trump could be followed up with concrete action, including tougher sanctions on Russia and continued military and intelligence support for Ukraine.
Russia 'promotes a strategy of destroying Ukraine as state', Zelenskyy's top aide says
Andriy Yermak, top aide to Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelenskyy, criticised Russia for “choosing war, masking it as ‘protecting its interests’” and saying that “in reality, Russia continues to promote a strategy of destroying Ukraine as a state”.
“This is the only ‘Russian interest’,” he said.
In a post on Telegram, he said “such arrogance is only possible because Russia receives direct assistance from North Korea and Iran”, and “circumvents sanctions with the help of other countries of the Global South”.
He warned:
“Today, Russia is challenging not only Ukraine and Europe, but also the United States.
Putin’s regime is incapable of stopping the war – this is possible only by force …”
Updated
EU says Sunday's 'not perfect' EU-US deal needs to be developed further
Meanwhile over in Brussels, EU trade spokesperson Olof Gill offered a bit more detail on what’s going on with the EU-US agreement amid growing questions about some of the details of what was agreed and let’s say less than whole-hearted support from some member states.
Addressing the media at the European Commission’s briefing just now, Gill said:
“Let me just be totally clear about what’s happening here, folks.
So on Sunday, the two presidents reached a deal, a political agreement.
What we are doing now is taking that political agreement, fleshing out the details, making sure that everything we need to be in there is in there that will lead to a joint statement. I can’t tell you precisely when that joint statement will be ready, but it should be soon.
That joint statement itself is not a legally binding document, but rather it’s a road map. It’s a political commitment, a series of political commitments, if you like.
And from that, we can generate the stability I talked about, the predictability I talked about, that we can get back to doing what we do best in terms of transatlantic trade and investment.
Our companies are deeply integrated supply chains, moving products and services across the Atlantic on a daily basis, worth €1.6tn annually.
And from there, we will look at further areas where we can reduce tariffs and other areas of cooperation.
But the joint statement, we view it as a kind of a platform, a foundation, from which we can allow transatlantic trade to continue to grow and to develop.”
He added:
“So we have now achieved and across the board, all inclusive tariff ceiling of 15%. That’s not the perfect outcome for the EU, nor is it the perfect outcome for the US.
We believe it gives us a platform for moving forward, for putting this kind of saga behind us, and focusing on allowing transatlantic trade to develop, to cooperate in key areas of economic and geopolitical importance in an unstable world.
And we are confident that this can enjoy the backing of our member states, of our businesses, of our citizens. We are making the best of a challenging situation, and we are determined to make this deal work.”
Russia 'takes note' of Trump's comments, but its 'special operation' continues, Kremlin spokesman says
We are now getting a reaction from the Kremlin, with spokesman Dmitry Peskov telling journalists that Russia “has taken note” of president Trump’s comments yesterday.
He then said that a “special military operation” – that’s their term for the illegal invasion of Ukraine – continues, but Russia “remains committed to the peace process to resolve the conflict around Ukraine and secure our interests” – despite deadly attacks overnight.
Peskov also confirmed that there was a “slowdown” in Russian efforts to revive diplomatic relations with the US.
Poland charges Colombian allegedly carrying out arson attacks on Russian orders
Speaking of Russian and Russian-inspired attacks, Poland said today that it believed a Colombian national acting on behalf of Russian intelligence services carried out two arson attacks in Poland last year.
The 27-year-old was trained by a person linked to Russian intelligence services, receiving detailed instructions on how to carry out the attacks, Polish authorities said.
The man was also later involved in an arson attack on a bus depot in the Czech Republic and was planning to carry out another attack on a shopping mall before being detained by the Czech authorities.
The Polish Internal Security Agency, or ABW, said that Russian intelligence services were using messaging service Telegram to “systemically and at large scale recruit people of Latin American origin and with previous military experience” to carry out attacks, later distributing photos and videos online for propaganda reasons.
The man was already sentenced to eight years in prison in the Czech Republic, and faces another sentence in Poland.
The disclosure from the Polish authorities come after the Czech intelligence services warned in their annual report that Russian recruiters particularly targeted poorer economic migrants from outside the EU to carry out attacks (Europe live earlier this month).
Updated
Overnight Russian strikes on Ukraine - in pictures
22 dead, 85 injured after Russian attacks on Ukraine overnight, Zelenskyy says
Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy has just confirmed that at least 22 people were killed, and 85 injured in attacks targeting 73 Ukrainian cities and villages overnight, just hours after “everyone once again felt hope for an end to the killings.”
He described some of the attacks in more detail, including a strike on a city hospital in Kamianske which killed three, including a pregnant 23-year-old woman, and a “deliberate” attack on a civilian penal colony in Zaporizhia.
Zelenskyy said:
Every murder of our people by the Russians; every Russian strike, when there could have been a ceasefire long ago, if Russia had not refused – all this shows that Moscow deserves very tough, truly painful, and therefore fair and effective sanctions pressure.
They must be forced to stop the killings and make peace.
He thanked US president Donald Trump for his comments on Monday, and to all leaders putting pressure on Russia, but added:
Peace is possible, but only when Russia stops the war that it started and stops tormenting our people.
Pharmaceutical exports from EU could be hit by 15% tariffs from Friday, adding to confusion on EU-US deal
in Brussels
Pharmaceutical exports from the EU to the US could be hit by 15% tariffs as soon as Friday, according to the White House.
It published a text on the EU trade deal stating pharma will be taxed at the base rate agreed in deal sealed at Donald Trump’s golf course on Sunday.
But it has caused yet more confusion because it comes less than 24 hours after EU officials were told that pharma would remain duty free until Trump’s 232 national security investigations into pharma and semiconductors concluded.
As part of President Trump’s strategy to establish balanced trade, the European Union will pay the United States a tariff rate of 15%, including on autos and auto parts, pharmaceuticals, and semiconductors.
However he had also said earlier this month he was going to phase in tariffs for pharma this week.
The text also says that the EU has agreed not to introduce a tech tax.
It says:
“The United States and the European Union intend to address unjustified digital trade barriers. In that respect, the European Union confirms that it will not adopt or maintain network usage fees. Furthermore, the United States and the European Union will maintain zero customs duties on electronic transmissions.”
EU consider partially suspending Israel from flagship science programme over Gaza
in Brussels
The EU is considering partially suspending Israel from its flagship Horizon Europe science research programme, in the first concrete sanction of Benjamin Netanyahu’s government since the killing of civilians in Gaza started.
It is understood the move will need qualified majority of support from member states, meaning no one country can block it.
As world continues to condemn the humanitarian catastrophe including demands by Donald Trump yesterday that the starvation of Gazan people must stop, it is the first sign that the bloc is prepared to take a concrete action.
“While Israel has announced a daily humanitarian pause in Gaza fighting and has met some of its commitments under the common understanding on humanitarian aid and access, the situation remains severe,” said a statement released by the Commission on 28 July.
It added that the suspension would flow from its review of the trade association agreement with Israel, prompted by calls for a review of the agreement by the Netherlands backed by 17 countries in May.
“This suspension comes as a reaction to the review Art. 2 of the EU-Israel Association Agreement. Respect for these obligations constitutes an essential part of EU-Israel cooperation under the Agreement, including for bilateral scientific and technological cooperation between the two parties.”
The decision was been taken by the college of European commissioners on Monday and will be put to the council of member states.
Updated
Morning opening: Russian attacks don't stop despite Trump's threat
More than 20 people were killed in Russian attacks on Ukraine overnight, just hours after US president Donald Trump sought to put more pressure on Moscow by shortening the deadline for reaching an agreement on a ceasefire to “10-12” days.
At least 16 people were killed in an attack on a Ukrainian prison, with more than 35 injured. More people died in other attacks in different parts of the country, including on a hospital and a private home, authorities reported.
Andriy Yermak, top aide to Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelenskyy, said:
This is another war crime by the Russians, who will not stop if they are not stopped.
He added:
“Putin’s regime, which also issues threats against the United States through some of its mouthpieces, must face economic and military blows that strip it of the capacity to wage war.”
President Zelenskyy expressed Ukraine’s high hopes last night, saying that Trump’s declaration was “right on time, when a lot can change through strength for real peace.”
Let’s see if we get any further reaction to the overnight attacks.
Elsewhere, we will be looking for more reactions from the EU and across the bloc to the EU-US trade deal signed at the weekend, the latest on German response to Gaza as chancellor Friedrich Merz meets with Jordanian King Abdullah II, and more news from across the continent.
I will bring you all key updates from across Europe here.
It’s Tuesday, 29 July 2025, it’s Jakub Krupa here, and this is Europe Live.
Good morning.
