World
Russian attacks on Ukraine infrastructure are war crimes: EU’s von der Leyen
Russia’s missile and drone attacks on power stations and other infrastructure in Ukraine are “acts of pure terror” that amount to war crimes, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said on Wednesday.
“Yesterday we saw again Russia’s targeted attacks against civilian infrastructure. This is marking another chapter in an already very cruel war. The international order is very clear. These are war crimes,” von der Leyen said in a speech to lawmakers in the European Parliament.
“Targeted attacks on civilian infrastructure with the clear aim to cut off men, women, children of water, electricity and heating with the winter coming, these are acts of pure terror and we have to call it as such.”
World
EU to give Greenland a cash boost amid Trump annexation drive
While Denmark is a member of the EU, Greenland left the bloc in 1985. But its people, as Danish citizens, are also citizens of the EU.
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen is expected to unveil on Monday a boost in EU investments in Greenland and closer political ties with the Danish Arctic territory, which Donald Trump has insisted should belong to the United States, Reuters reported.
Von der Leyen arrived in Greenland on Sunday for a two-day visit serving as a show of support for the governments of Greenland and Denmark, which have strongly rebuffed Trump’s campaign to annex the world’s largest island.
The head of the 27-nation European Union’s executive body, von der Leyen is expected to unveil plans to invest in sectors including critical minerals, satellite communications and renewable energy in Greenland, a semi-autonomous part of the Danish realm.
On Sunday in Nuuk, the capital, von der Leyen said the package would be “substantial” but gave no details. Greenland Premier Jens-Frederik Nielsen said his country wanted to build on its “close friendship and good partnership” with the EU.
Von der Leyen’s visit reflects the increasing geopolitical importance of the Arctic to major powers, such as the United States, Russia, China and Europe, as melting ice opens new shipping routes to make the region’s mineral wealth more accessible.
“Greenland’s stunning landscapes and natural beauty will stay with me for a long time. But so will the visible scars of climate change on the ice sheet,” von der Leyen posted on X after a boat trip under clear blue skies in a fjord scattered with chunks of ice.
“As the ice melts, a new reality is taking shape.”
Trump, the U.S. president, sparked a crisis in U.S.-European ties and turmoil within the transatlantic NATO military alliance this year when he stepped up his demands for the U.S. to control Greenland, arguing that fellow NATO member Denmark could not defend it.
European officials stressed Greenland is part of NATO territory, meaning it is covered by the alliance’s mutual defence pact, and that the U.S. already has the right to increase its military presence there under a longstanding treaty.
Tensions lowered after Trump and NATO boss Mark Rutte agreed in Davos in January that the United States, Denmark and Greenland would begin talks to resolve their differences and NATO would step up its role in Arctic security, read the report.
However, the trilateral talks have yet to yield an agreement and, at a NATO summit in Turkey in July, Trump restated his insistence that the U.S. should control Greenland.
While Denmark is a member of the EU, Greenland left the bloc in 1985. But its people, as Danish citizens, are also citizens of the EU.
The EU has long provided funding to Greenland, mainly to pay for fishing rights and support its education system. The package to be announced by von der Leyen will represent not only a big increase in funding but a broadening of the sectors that will receive EU cash, according to EU officials.
World
US envoys make first Kyiv visit amid Ukraine war peace push
Kushner and Witkoff travelled from Moscow, where they held three hours of talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Saturday but did not appear to secure a breakthrough in the conflict, Reuters reported.
U.S. peace envoys Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy in Kyiv on Sunday as the Trump administration renewed its push to end Russia’s four-and-a-half-year war in Ukraine.
Kushner and Witkoff travelled from Moscow, where they held three hours of talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Saturday but did not appear to secure a breakthrough in the conflict, Reuters reported.
Previous rounds of U.S.-mediated peace talks encouraged by President Donald Trump, who campaigned on a promise to quickly end the war, have yielded few results. He suggested on Friday that the U.S. had a fresh proposal though he did not elaborate.
Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov described Saturday’s meeting as “highly useful”, while a White House official told Reuters that next steps would be announced in the coming weeks.
The two envoys met Zelenskiy and other top Ukrainian officials in central Kyiv.
Zelenskiy, who believes Washington will be key to any peace deal, has said a window of opportunity to make peace exists before the U.S. begins focusing on its next presidential election.
After the first round of talks between Ukrainian and U.S. negotiators that lasted about three hours, the U.S. envoys said that they were looking forward to making more progress.
“Substantive, important, and we are very encouraged,” Witkoff told reporters after the talks, which also included a working lunch.
Zelenskiy said that more talks, which would also include European representatives, were planned later on Sunday. British, French and German national security advisers were in Kyiv on Sunday.
“Security guarantees are needed. A dignified post-war peace is needed. Our proposals have been drawn up,” Zelenskiy said as his negotiating team was preparing to meet U.S. envoys.
CAUTIOUS OPTIMISM ON THE STREETS OF KYIV
Witkoff and Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law, have visited Moscow several times in their roles as peace envoys. But Sunday is their first visit to Kyiv in their capacity as U.S. negotiators.
Their visit has long been sought by Ukraine’s leadership, and on the streets of Kyiv, which has been bombarded heavily in recent weeks, some residents were hopeful.
“The issue can be solved in the blink of an eye. We want peace. I’ve fought myself, so I know what war is like. We need peace, because there’s no other way,” said military veteran Stepan Yermak.
In previous talks, the sides have remained far apart on key issues, including the future of the eastern Ukrainian region of Donbas. Russia has demanded Ukraine’s withdrawal from an entrenched belt of towns that it still controls there, but Kyiv has refused, reasoning that it can still hold on.
For Ukraine, hard security guarantees from its European allies and the U.S. are crucial to deterring Russia from invading again.
“We need an agreement that will never be broken,” said Svitlana Kurylenko, a 19-year-old cafe worker.
“Just leave Ukraine alone and let people live in peace.”
TEMPORARY HALT IN STRIKES
Though the front lines of the ground war remain largely static, both Russian and Ukrainian forces have intensified long-range air strikes in recent weeks.
Russia has pounded the Ukrainian capital day and night with missiles and drones for the past two weeks, including an attack on Friday on the headquarters of the SBU security service.
The Kremlin has said it would pause strikes on Kyiv until Monday, while Zelenskiy has said Ukraine would also halt strikes on Moscow.
There was no let-up in fighting along the 1,200-km (750-mile) front, however, and Russia bombarded other Ukrainian cities on Saturday.
Ukraine has inflicted damaging hits throughout the summer on Russian refineries, oil terminals and the warehouses of online retailer Wildberries, in an attempt to raise the cost to Moscow of continuing the war.
Ukraine said on Sunday it had struck the Ryazan oil refinery, around 480 km (300 miles) inside Russia, overnight, causing a fire.
World
World food prices at highest since 2022 as supply risks mount, FAO says
World food prices rose in August to their highest since late 2022, as adverse weather and war disruption in the Black Sea heightened concern over supply of staples, the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization said on Friday.
Extreme heat and drought in Europe, the threat of a severe El Nino weather pattern and trade upheaval caused by the Ukraine and Iran wars have unsettled agricultural markets, pushing grain prices to three-year highs and sugar to a one-year peak.
The FAO Food Price Index, which tracks monthly changes in a basket of internationally traded food commodities, averaged 133.3 points in August, up from July’s revised reading of 130.8.
That was the highest score since November 2022, though nearly 17% below a record peak from March 2022, after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
“August’s increase in global food prices is a warning that the risk premium is returning to food markets: climate shocks, geopolitical tensions and disrupted trade logistics are converging to tighten supply expectations,” FAO Chief Economist Maximo Torero said in a statement.
The FAO’s price benchmarks for cereals, vegetable oils, sugar, meat and dairy all rose in August.
The extreme weather in Europe affected prospects for the maize (corn) and sugar beet harvests as well as livestock output, while the anticipated El Nino phenomenon fuelled concerns for palm oil and sugar output in Asia, it said.
Escalating attacks in the Black Sea have curtailed grain shipments from Russia and Ukraine in their 4-1/2-year-old war, while the U.S.-Iran conflict was straining flows of fertiliser for crops.
Among food categories, FAO’s cereals price index rose 2.2% month-on-month to its highest since May 2024, and the vegetable oil index edged up 0.6% to its highest since June 2022.
The agency’s sugar benchmark jumped 11.9% to its highest since June 2025, with lower production in Brazil’s crucial center-south region adding to weather concerns in Europe and Asia.
In a separate report, the agency cut its 2026 global cereal production forecast by 3.4 million metric tons from a previous estimate in July to 2.980 billion tons, now 2.0% below 2025 in the largest annual decline since 2018.
Projected output would still be the second-largest on record, however.
Forecast world cereal stocks at the close of 2026/2027 were revised down 1.1% to 947.2 million tons, now only marginally above the previous season.
A reduced estimate of coarse grain stocks outweighed an upward revision for wheat that reflected an anticipated build-up in Russian and Ukrainian stocks due to shipping disruption, the FAO said.
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