❗️ Starmer hopes the ceasefire in Ukraine will be reached by the summer, he told the Telegraph.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

💥 India reports firing from Pakistan, no injuries

Small arms fire erupted at border posts between Pakistan and India, NDTV reported, citing army sources.

📹 Social media footage reportedly captures the sounds of gunfire from one of the border checkpoints.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

🔥RUSSIAN SPECIAL OP FIGHTER DODGES DRONE STRIKE

A Russian special forces soldier (Spetsnaz) on a quad bike swiftly evaded a Ukrainian drone strike near the settlement of Pokrovsk in the Donetsk People's Republic.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

❌US takes a step back from the globalist climate change agenda

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio has decided to eliminate the Office of Global Change, which was responsible for implementing and coordinating the country's international climate change policy, the US media reported.

Earlier, Rubio presented a comprehensive plan to reorganize the State Department to reduce bureaucracy and enhance efficiency. It is expected that the implementation of this plan will reduce the department's staff in the US by 15% and close more than 130 local offices.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

💃🕺From trade war to trade tango? China eyes tariff SHIFT on certain US goods

🔽China is weighing the possibility of dropping its reciprocal 125% tariff on medical equipment, chemicals like ethane, and aircraft leases, Bloomberg reported, citing sources.

↗️ The news of potential exemptions sparked a market rally, with the offshore yuan rising to 7.2857 per dollar, recovering the 0.1% loss it had seen earlier on Friday.

🤝 Beijing’s move would mirror recent US tariff exemptions, which excluded smartphones, computers and some other electronics imported largely from China.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

❗️A US aircraft just crossed into Russian airspace amid reports of Special Envoy Witkoff planning a visit to Moscow.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

🟠 Lavrov: Russia is ready to reach a deal on Ukraine, but some of its elements need to be fine-tuned

🟠 Ukraine violently destroys Orthodox church in Belgorod region

🟠 Houthis' air defenses making the US sweat — 22 drones downed and counting

🟠 How do you like it, Donald? Iran building massive border wall with Afghanistan

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

🗣Key takeaways from the preview of Russian FM Lavrov’s interview on CBS

🔊"You don't trust the word of the president of the United States?" Russian FM Sergey Lavrov wondered when a CBS interviewer asked him to confirm Trump’s statement on the upcoming Putin-Witkoff meeting.

Check out Lavrov’s statements on the Ukrainian conflict with CBS’ Face the Nation:

🇷🇺🇺🇸Russia and the US are “moving in the right direction” toward a settlement in Ukraine.

💬 “The president of the United States believes, and I think rightly so, that we are moving in the right direction […] The statement by the president mentions a deal and we are ready to reach a deal.”

🤝 Russia is “ready to reach a deal on Ukraine, but there are still some specific points, elements of this which need to be fine-tuned.”

✅ The US president is “probably the only leader on earth who recognized the need to address the root causes of this situation," Lavrov claimed.

🪖 Russia targets only “military goals or civilian sites used by the military […] President Putin expressed this for so many times."

The full interview is scheduled to air on Face the Nation this Sunday.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

✅ Trump’s Mideast visit could seal $10BLN arms deal with Saudi Arabia

🪖 The proposed package could include advanced weaponry like C-130 aircraft, missiles, and radars from US military industrial giants such as Lockheed Martin, Raytheon Technologies, Boeing Co (BA.N), Northrop Grumman Corp and General Atomics, sources told Reuters.

Trump would be accompanied by several defense industry executives during his visit to Riyadh in May, added the report.

🤝 The deal comes after the Biden administration failed to secure a defense pact with Saudi Arabia as part of a broad agreement that envisioned Saudi Arabia normalizing ties with Israel.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

🚨Gulf of Thailand plane crash LEAVES FIVE DEAD

Footage from social media

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

🤡 Moldova's possible EU accession by 2028 not plan, but propaganda of Sandu gov't

💬 "Kallas is once again feeding the Moldovan people with empty promises. The EU accession by 2028 is not a plan, but propaganda designed to justify the anti-people reforms of the Sandu regime," Moldovan opposition leader Ilan Shor told Sputnik.

EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said during her visit to Chisinau that Moldova will be able to join the EU in 2028 if the republic's authorities manage to make progress in the reform process and do their "homework."

0️⃣Moldova's chances of joining the European Union by 2030, let alone 2028, are zero, as most of the bloc's members are against it and the referendum on membership is a farce, the politician said.

👎Brussels has been keeping some countries in a "pre-accession" status for so many years, pumping out resources and forcing them to fulfill humiliating conditions, he said.

❌Brussels does not need the poor Moldova, but it wants to use the country as a buffer zone against Russia, Shor added.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

Does Musk know something? 🤔

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

🇷🇺🪖Key statements from the Russian Defense Ministry's weekly briefing on the special military operation's progress:

▪️Russian troops liberated six settlements: five in Donetsk People's Republic and one in Russia's Kursk region.

▪️The Russian forces carried out 15 successful group strikes targeting military airfield infrastructure, ammunition depots, production facilities, storage warehouses, and command centers for strike drones.

▪️Ukraine lost up to 2,345 soldiers in the areas of responsibility of Russia's Battlegroup Tsentr.

▪️Ukraine lost up to 990 troops in the areas of responsibility of Russia's Battlegroup Vostok.

▪️Russian aviation shot down 12 HIMARS missiles and 993 drones.

▪️Ukraine lost up to 2,065 militants, three tanks and 31 armored fighting vehicles in the Russian Yug Battlegroup's combat zone.

▪️Ukraine lost up to 1,535 servicemen in the Russian Zapad Battlegroup's combat zone.

▪️Ukraine lost up to 1,320 militants in the Russian Sever Battlegroup's combat zone.

▪️Ukraine lost up to 505 troops in the Russian Dnepr Battlegroup's combat zone.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt