Zelenskyi is expected to meet with Biden twice in the course of two weeks. Ukraine responds to China saying that more than 20 countries back Beijing’s peace plan. Ukraine’s defense intelligence is behind large-scale DDoS attacks on Russian government agencies.
Zelenskyi to meet with Biden twice in course of two weeks
U.S. President Joe Biden will meet with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky while he is in Normandy, France, this week, according to White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan, cited by CNN. They will have another meeting at next week’s G7 in Italy, he added.
“While he’s in Normandy, he’ll have the opportunity to sit down with President Zelensky and have an engagement with him to talk about the state of play in Ukraine and how we can continue and deepen our support for Ukraine,” Sullivan told reporters aboard Air Force One while en route to France.
Sullivan added that Biden is also expected to meet with Zelensky during the G7 in Italy next week.
“In the course of a little more than a week, the president will have two substantive engagements with President Zelensky,” Sullivan said.
French President Emmanuel Macron will host Ukraine’s leader Volodymyr Zelensky on Friday, June 7, in Paris for talks on the war-battered nation’s needs, the Elysée palace announced, according to Le Monde. The Ukrainian president, who will be welcomed by France’s Armed Forces Minister Sebastien Lecornu with military honors on Friday morning, will visit a site of the Franco-German arms group KNDS near Paris. The defense group makes artillery guns used in Ukraine.
Zelensky will also deliver a speech in France’s Assemblée Nationale — the lower house of parliament, and meet with the president of the Assemblée, Yaël Braun-Pivet, who visited Ukraine in March.
Ukraine responds to China saying more than 20 countries back Beijing’s peace plan
China’s top diplomat said more than two dozen countries have expressed backing for Beijing’s vision to resolve the “Russia-Ukraine conflict,” according to Bloomberg.
Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi told reporters on Tuesday that Russia and Ukraine have separately “affirmed most of the content” of the principles for a political solution that were laid out by China and Brazil in a joint statement last month.
He didn’t specifically address Ukraine’s core demand that Russia withdraw from all of its territory annexed since 2014 before any negotiations can start.
Wang said 26 nations have agreed to join — or are seeking ways to join — in the “common understandings” that China and Brazil have reached. He said a total of 45 countries have given “positive feedback” to the ideas, according to the foreign ministry.
Responding to the comments of China’s chief diplomat, the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry said in a statement that it’s Ukraine that must define “what peace should look like” as it is “the side on whose territory the war takes place and the country that bears the full brunt of Russian aggression.” The only just foundation for achieving such peace is President Zelenskyi’s Peace Formula, it added.
“Next week, the Global Peace Summit will take place in Switzerland. We believe that all states that sincerely want peace to be restored should work together to ensure the Summit is success rather than making efforts to undermine it,” the statement reads.
The participation of a high-ranking Chinese official could have provided an excellent opportunity to make a practical contribution to achieving a just and lasting peace in Ukraine while also restoring its territorial integrity, Ukraine’s Foreign Ministry said. “With four leader summits between China and the aggressor state Russia since the start of the full-scale invasion, this would be a significant signal of China’s balanced position,” it added.
Ukraine’s defense intelligence behind large-scale DDoS attacks on Russian government agencies
The cyber unit of the Main Intelligence Department of Ukraine’s Defense Ministry carried out a large-scale distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack on Russian government agencies and private companies on Wednesday, a source in Ukraine’s defense intelligence told The New Voice of Ukraine.
The DDoS incidents took down a number of digital services. Roskomnadzor, Russia’s communication regulator, said the disruption was caused by “a failure of the main communication network,” but the actual reason was a massive DDoS attack launched by Ukraine’s defense intelligence cyber professionals, the source said.
As of Wednesday morning, internet users in Russia could not access e-services offered by the government, including some services through the web sites of the ministries of defense, finance, internal affairs, justice, industries and energy, IT and communications, and emergency situations.
The Russian tax service had its web site and digital services disrupted. It said it had difficulties exchanging data with foreign economic operators because of a DDoS attack.
Clients of Sberbank and Alfabank were cut off from some bank services. VKontakte social media services were disrupted. The civil registration system has been down for several days in some of the regions.
The disruptions also affected a group of aircraft manufacturing companies and Gosoblako government cloud services.
Ukraine’s Role on the World Stage: Center or Periphery? Ukraine in Flames #620
Both in war and peace, Ukraine will be a test of determination, unity, and even industrial potential for the West. There is an opinion that the center of gravity of NATO is shifting from France and Germany to the east and north. European defense is increasingly being rethought in Poland, the Scandinavian countries, and Ukraine. Post-Brexit Britain has also shown that it can still be at the forefront of Europe in terms of defense and security. Watch Ukraine in Flames #620 to find out about Ukraine’s role in the new global order. Is it at the center of world events, or does it remain on the periphery of global alliances and decision-making?
The invited experts were speakers at Book Arsenal 2024 in Kyiv, and the panel was held in collaboration with UCMC and UkraineWorld.
Guests:
- Botakoz Kassymbekova, Assistant Professor in Modern History at University of Basel
- Volodymyr Yermolenko, Philosopher, President of PEN Ukraine
- Bruno Maçães, Portuguese Philosopher, Journalist, Politician
