Ukraine would join the European Union as early as January 2027 under the latest US plan to end the war with Russia, a senior source told Agence France-Presse on Friday. “It’s stated there but it’s a matter for negotiation, and the Americans support it,” the official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said. The complicated EU accession process usually takes years and requires a unanimous vote from all 27 members of the bloc. Some countries, most notably Hungary, have consistently voiced opposition to Ukraine joining.
The proposal was met with scepticism in Brussels, with diplomats and officials dismissing it as unrealistic. “2027, it’s tomorrow,” said an EU official referring to the normally long time it takes to get things done in Brussels. “As if the Americans are going to decide for us,” a European diplomat said. “It’s nonsense: there needs to be an appetite for enlargement that isn’t there.”
Volodymyr Zelenskyy will visit Berlin on Monday for talks on bilateral relations and peace negotiations over the war. The Ukrainian president and Germany’s Friedrich Merz will be joined by “many European heads of state and government” and top representatives of the EU and Nato for further discussions, a German government statement said. US envoy Steve Witkoff will also meet Zelenskyy and European leaders in Berlin this weekend, the Wall Street Journal reported on Friday, citing officials. Witkoff would meet with his counterparts from the UK, France and Germany on Sunday and Monday, the newspaper said.
Europeans and Ukrainians are asking the US to provide them with “security guarantees” before any territorial negotiations in Russian-occupied eastern Ukraine, the French presidency said on Friday. “We need full visibility on the security guarantees that Europeans and Americans can give to Ukrainians before any settlement on contentious territorial issues,” the Elysee said ahead of the Berlin meeting. Kyiv is under pressure from the White House to secure a quick peace but is pushing back on a US-backed plan many say favours Moscow.
The EU agreed on Friday to indefinitely freeze €210bn (£185bn/$247bn) of Russian central bank assets held in Europe. The European Council president, António Costa, confirmed on Friday EU leaders had delivered on a commitment, made in October, to “keep Russian assets immobilised until Russia ends its war of aggression against Ukraine and compensates for the damage caused”, Jennifer Rankin writes.
The EU decision came hours after Russia’s central bank said it was filing a lawsuit against Euroclear, the Brussels central securities depository that holds the €210bn. The lawsuit, being filed in a Moscow court, claims Euroclear’s “illegal actions” had caused “damage” to the central bank’s ability to manage funds and securities. Euroclear declined to comment, but a spokesperson said it was “currently fighting more than 100 legal claims in Russia”.
Russia on Friday sentenced top international criminal court (ICC) judges and its chief prosecutor to jail terms, in a retaliatory move after the court issued an arrest warrant for Vladimir Putin over the Ukraine war. The Moscow city court found that “ICC prosecutor Karim Khan unlawfully prosecuted Russian citizens in The Hague” and that the ICC “instructed the judges of the chamber to issue patently unlawful arrest warrants”. Khan was sentenced to 15 years in jail in absentia, while eight ICC staff – including the former court president Piotr Hofmanski – received prison terms ranging from 3.5 to 15 years.
Ukrainian forces said they had retaken parts of the north-eastern town of Kupiansk and had encircled Russian troops there as Zelenskyy visited the area and praised the operation. Moscow has said it is advancing on all fronts and that it has seized Kupiansk and the strategic city of Pokrovsk in the east. Kyiv has denied this, saying fighting is continuing.
Ukrainian drones struck two Russian oil rigs in the Caspian Sea, an official in Kyiv’s SBU security service said on Friday. The source said SBU drones hit the Filanovsky and Korchagin oil rigs, which both belong to Russia’s Lukoil. The Filanovsky rig – part of Russia’s largest Caspian oilfield – came under attack earlier this week.
Russia attacked two Ukrainian ports on Friday, damaging three Turkish-owned vessels including a ship carrying food supplies, Ukrainian officials and one shipowner said. The attack came hours after the Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, told Putin that a limited ceasefire for energy facilities and ports could be beneficial.
Donald Trump said on Friday a contentious US-proposed free economic zone in Ukraine-controlled parts of the eastern Donbas would work, without giving further details. On Thursday Zelenskyy had questioned the proposal, saying: “Who will govern this territory, which they are calling a ‘free economic zone’ or a ‘demilitarised zone’ – they don’t know.” He said the plan was not fair without solid guarantees Russian troops would not simply take over the zone after a Ukrainian withdrawal.
