Donald Trump says Vladimir Putin will be forced to end the Ukraine war if energy prices fall because “his economy stinks” – three days before his deadline for the Russian leader to stop fighting or face harsh sanctions. Follow the latest below.
Tuesday 5 August 2025 16:28, UK
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We’re taking a pause on our coverage of the war in Ukraine but we’ll be back soon.
Today, Volodymyr Zelenskyy claimed Ukrainian troops in the north east of the country are fighting foreign “mercenaries” from various countries, including China, Pakistan and parts of Africa.
Zelenskyy has previously accused Moscow of recruiting Chinese fighters, which Beijing denied, while North Korea has provided thousands of its own troops in Russia’s Kursk region.
Also, Donald Trump said declining energy prices could pressure Vladimir Putin to halt the war in Ukraine.
He added that he will soon raise tariffs on India “very substantially” over its continued purchase of Russian oil, a decision criticised by New Delhi and Moscow.
Here are the other key lines from today:
Debris and rubble strewn across the ground.
These are just some of the scenes emerging from the town of Lozova, in the northeast Kharkiv region.
It comes after a Russian drone strike at a railway station in the region.
Governor Oleh Syniehubov said the attack involved 34 drones and damaged the train station and a nearby rail depot.
Volodymyr Zelensky has invited Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the Turkish president, to visit Ukraine in what would be his first official trip to the country since 2022.
In an interview with the RBK-Ukraine news agency, Ukraine’s ambassador to Ankara, Nariman Dzheilal, said: “President Zelenskyy personally extended the invitation, and I reiterated it during my meeting with the Turkish president.
“This visit requires significant effort, as there are many issues hindering its realisation.”
Dzheilal said the Turkish side had not yet confirmed the visit.
NATO member Turkey has maintained cordial ties with both Kyiv and Moscow since Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022.
It has voiced support for Ukraine’s territorial integrity and provided it with military help, while opposing sanctions on Russia.
Turkey has also hosted talks between Russia and Ukraine.
Further to reports we brought you earlier on the Netherlands becoming the first contributor to NATO’s new financing mechanism for Ukrainian weapons (see post at 11.53am), we are now hearing that Sweden, Norway and Denmark will also contribute.
The three nations will together contribute around $486.1m to the NATO-led initiative to supply Ukraine with US weapons, the Norwegian government has said.
What do you need to know?
In July, Donald Trump pledged to make new weapons available to Ukraine.
Under a new deal, the US will sell weapons to NATO members who will then supply them to Kyiv.
Yesterday, the Dutch defence minister, Ruben Brekelmans, said the Netherlands would contribute £500m to buy US military equipment for Ukraine as part of the Priority Ukraine Requirements List (PURL) scheme.
Boris Johnson has drawn comparisons between Russia’s “appalling” war in Ukraine and China’s intensifying pressure on Taiwan.
Johnson, who was British PM at the time of Russia’s full-scale invasion, appeared as a keynote speaker at the Indo-Pacific Security Forum held in Tapei.
He used his speech to focus on global security and to condemn Russia’s actions in Ukraine, as well as calling on Western nations “not to be cowered by our desire to be deferential to Beijing”.
Here is what he had to say…
Donald Trump says declining energy prices could pressure Vladimir Putin to halt the war in Ukraine.
“If energy goes down enough, Putin is going to stop killing people,” he said in an interview on CNBC.
“Putin will stop killing people if we get energy down another $10 a barrel. He’ll have no choice because his economy stinks.”
Trump added that he will soon raise tariffs on India “very substantially” over its continued purchase of Russian oil, a decision criticised by New Delhi and Moscow.
He said: “They’re buying Russian oil, they’re fuelling the war machine. If they’re going to do that, then I’m not going to be happy.”
Trump’s comments come ahead of his Friday deadline for Russia to end the war in Ukraine or face potentially severe economic penalties from Washington.
So far, Trump’s threats have failed to shift the Kremlin’s position.
The US president’s special envoy Steve Witkoff is due in Russia this week for another round of talks with Russian officials.
Ukraine’s military intelligence special forces says its troops have killed 334 Russian soldiers in the northeast Sumy region.
In a post on Telegram, the intelligence agency said soldiers of the Tymur Special Unit moved behind Russian lines and “cleared the positions”, stopping Kremlin troops from progressing in the direction of the city of Sumy.
In addition to the 334 killed, it said another 550 were wounded.
The intelligence agency did not specify the exact date or location of the fight.
Sky News cannot independently verify these claims.
Kremlin officials are slowly organising a “coordinated response” to Donald Trump’s plan to redeploy two nuclear submarines closer to Russia, according to the Institute for the Study of War.
Trump ordered the repositioning of two US submarines to “appropriate regions” relative to Russia last Friday.
It comes as the US president grows increasingly frustrated over stalling peace talks with Russia.
While the Kremlin did not immediately respond, Russian officials have now “begun to coalesce around similar rhetorical lines”, the ISW notes, and are posing Trump’s decision as “emotional”.
The US-based thinktank points to comments yesterday by Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov, who said that discussions of nuclear escalation are premature and a “very emotional” perception of the situation.
Trump: ‘We’re going to protect our people’
Meanwhile, Grigory Karasin, chair of Russia’s foreign affairs council committee, said it was always better to be less emotional and more rational in foreign policy.
And Russian state duma deputy Mikhail Matveev also called Trump’s response “emotional”.
“These official Russian responses ignore the Kremlin’s history of frequently leveraging nuclear sabre-rattling to push the West to make decisions that benefit Russia,” the ISW says.
The thinktank also notes that Russia regularly uses Russian Security Council Deputy chairman Dmitry Medvedev to introduce nuclear threats into the Russian and international information spaces.
The Netherlands will be the first contributor to NATO’s new financing mechanism for Ukrainian weapons, with a £500m payment, the Dutch defence ministry has announced.
Donald Trump said last month the US would supply weapons to Ukraine, paid for by European allies, but did not provide details on how this would work.
But yesterday, the Dutch defence minister, Ruben Brekelmans, said the Netherlands would contribute money to buy US military equipment for Ukraine as part of the Priority Ukraine Requirements List (PURL) scheme.
He said that the package would include Patriot parts and missiles.
Welcoming the move, NATO’s chief, Mark Rutte, said he had encouraged other members to participate in the new mechanism.
The equipment that will be provided is based on Ukraine’s priority needs on the battlefield.
And NATO allies then locate the weapons and ammunition and send them on.
Russia has claimed its troops have captured the village of Sichneve in Ukraine’s east-central Dnipro region.
Sky News cannot independently verify this claim.
There have been reports over the last few days of new Russian military action in Ukraine’s east and southeast.
Ukraine’s top commander said Moscow’s forces were changing their tactics, using smaller sabotage units in a bid to push forward with their drive through the eastern Donetsk region.
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