Ukraine could buy up to 150 Gripen fighter jets from Sweden, paid for using frozen Russian assets, under a deal agreed on Wednesday. Ukraine already has US-made F-16 and French-made Mirage 2000 fighter jets. The Gripen has long been vaunted as more practical for Ukrainian battlefield conditions – being built, for example, to take off and land on civilian roads as well as runways so that it can fight from dispersed locations rather than just airfields. The Swedish PM, Ulf Kristersson, said financing of the procurement could come via frozen Russian assets held in western countries and from allied nations in the “coalition of the willing”. “We fully realise it’s a long road ahead of us … But from today we are committed to exploring all the possibilities in providing Ukraine with a large amount of Gripen fighters in the future.”
Volodymyr Zelenskyy, Ukraine’s president, said his military aimed to receive and start using Gripen jets next year, adding: “For our army, Gripens are a priority. It is about money, about manoeuvres.” Justin Bronk, air warfare expert at London’s Royal United Services Institute, said the Gripen E would “hypothetically represent a significantly more capable medium-weight fighter” than Ukraine’s existing fleet because of its radar, internal electronic warfare systems and ability to carry and launch long-range Meteor air-to-air missiles. Sweden has ordered 60 of the latest Gripen E model and Saab is increasing capacity in its Linkoping plant aiming to produce 20 to 30 planes per year, as well as building them in Brazil.
As Donald Trump announced sanctions on Rosneft and Lukoil, Russia’s two largest oil companies, the European Union also agreed to impose new measures to curb Moscow’s oil and gas revenues. The EU package is its 19th since the 2022 invasion. It will bring forward a ban on the import of liquefied natural gas from Russia by a year to the start of 2027. It also blacklists more than 100 additional tankers from Moscow’s “shadow fleet”, and imposes controls on the travel of Russian diplomats suspected of espionage.
The EU package is scheduled to be formally adopted on Thursday just before Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, joins EU leaders at a summit in Brussels. Jennifer Rankin writes that as well as the 19th package of sanctions, EU leaders are expected to declare “unwavering support” for Ukraine’s independence and endorse plans for a €140bn (£122bn/$162bn) loan to Kyiv based on Russia’s frozen assets.
Zelenskyy has voiced support for Donald Trump’s proposal for Ukraine and Russia to freeze the war at the current frontlines, calling it “a good compromise”, Pjotr Sauer reports, even as the Ukrainian president acknowledged Moscow had made clear it would not accept the arrangement.
Russian drones attacked Kyiv for the second night running, with fragments injuring four people and damaging buildings in several districts, officials said early on Thursday. Tymur Tkachenko, head of Kyiv’s military administration, said drones had damaged several dwellings and other buildings, including a kindergarten. City officials issued a warning for a possible missile attack on the capital. Russian missile and drone attacks in different parts of Ukraine on Tuesday night killed six people, including two children.
