Trump launched a series of extraordinary attacks on President Zelensky this week, describing him as a dictator, and sidelined Ukraine in peace negotiations he began with Putin to end the war with Russia. In anticipation of a crucial meeting with Trump next week, Keir Starmer has insisted that Ukraine must be ‘at the heart of any negotiations’, and the UK has also announced new Russian sanctions.
On Sky News this morning, Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson confirmed that defence spending in the UK will be raised to 2.5 per cent of GDP, although she gave no timeline on when that might be achieved. Speaking to Trevor Phillips, Phillipson said it was right we make ‘absolutely clear where responsibility lies for the conflict’, and that the government would ‘bear down as hard as we can’ on Russia. However, she stopped short of criticising Trump directly, saying that talking to Putin was a ‘step forward’, and that the US is doing the right thing in ‘taking the lead’ with the negotiations.
James Cartlidge: ‘As a country… we have got to be more resilient’
On the BBC, shadow defence secretary James Cartlidge told Laura Kuenssberg that the government had to go ‘further and faster’ than the proposed 2.5
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