Ukraine-Russia war live: Putin has to come to table ‘sooner or later’, Starmer says as he warns ‘not to play games’

Sir Keir Starmer continued: “Secondly, being prepared to defend any deal ourselves through a coalition of the willing. We’ve begun that process and this morning we can take it forward.

“And then, thirdly, and really importantly, given the developments of the last few days, to keep the pressure on Putin to come to the table, and I think collectively we’ve got a number of ways that we can do that.

“So it’s those three heads, really, that we’re going to focus on in this meeting, strengthening Ukraine, being prepared to defend any deal ourselves through a coalition of the willing, and keeping that pressure on Russia at this crucial time.”

We have some more detail on Sir Keir Starmer’s latest comments on Putin and Ukraine.

Speaking in Downing Street ahead of a video call with world leaders, he said the “world is watching”.

The Prime Minister went on: “My feeling is that sooner or later (Mr Putin’s) going to have to come to the table and engage in serious discussion, but – and this is a big but for us this morning in our meeting – we can’t sit back and simply wait for that to happen.

“We have to keep pushing ahead, pushing forward, and preparing for peace, and a peace that will be secure and that will last.

“I think that means strengthening Ukraine so they can defend themselves, and strengthening, obviously, in terms of military capability, in terms of funding, in terms of the provision of further support from all of us to Ukraine.”

Around 25 countries are set to join a meeting hosted by Sir Keir Starmer to discuss a peacekeeping force for Ukraine.

World leaders from countries including Britain, France, Australia and Canada will virtually meet on Saturday – but it is still unclear if one leader, Italy’s Giorgia Meloni, will join.

The Italian prime minister has been critical of proposals to send troops to Ukraine to enforce any peace deal made with Russia.

Reports earlier this week suggested she would shun Saturday’s meeting of the ‘coalition of the willing’, with sources telling The Telegraph that she is “not convinced” by the plans.

Ahead of the meeting on Saturday Giangiacomo Calovini, an MP from the ruling party in Italy, was unable to say whether she would take part in Saturday’s call.

We will update you as soon as we know whether Ms Meloni will be taking part in the morning.

Russian troops have recaptured the villages of Rubanshchina and Zaoleshenka in its western Kursk region, the Defence Ministry said on Saturday.

Russia has accelerated a push to drive Ukrainian forces out of Kursk, where they took control of about 100 settlements in a surprise incursion into Russian territory last August.

After humiliating Zelensky into submission, Trump briefly put the ball into Putin’s court to accept a ceasefire, writes Jon Sopel. But the US president is not the master strategist he likes to think he is – and now has a crunch decision to make about what comes next.

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Sir Keir Starmer is preparing to host a virtual summit of around 25 countries on Saturday to discuss a peacekeeping force for Ukraine.

The countries in the “coalition of the willing”, which include Britain, France, Australia and Canada, will discuss how to help Kyiv deter future Russian aggression in the event of any peace deal.

The meeting will look at how countries plan to contribute to the coalition of the willing, ahead of a military planning session next week.

During his meeting, Sir Keir will call on Western leaders to make “concrete commitments”, including to ramp up economic pressure as well as military support to Ukraine to defend itself against increasing Russian attacks.

Some Ukrainians have been left without power after Russia targeted energy facilities in overnight airstrikes.

Ukraine’s largest private energy provider said on Saturday its energy facilities in the Dnipropetrovsk and Odesa regions had been damaged by the strikes.

In a statement, DTEK said “damages are significant” and that some consumers in both regions were left without power.

Giangiacomo Calovini, an MP from the ruling party in Italy, was unable to say whether Italian prime minister Giorgia Meloni would take part in Saturday’s call with the “coalition of the willing”.

He said: “I think there’s a discussion about it and I think a few hours ago there’s some contact between your Prime Minister and Giorgia Meloni because they are talking and trying to understand, which is the problem of the meeting of today.”

He added: “Our position now is that if the meeting is only to talk about the troops in Ukraine, it is not important now.

“It doesn’t mean we don’t send our troops (to) Ukraine, but we think it’s too early to talk about this topic.”