Ukraine, the US, the EU, and NATO plan to meet in Brussels this week to discuss security for Ukraine, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy told Ukrainian TV. The meeting would follow last week’s talks in Oslo and a US envoy’s visit to Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Guarantees are what would oblige Ukraine’s allies to act if Russia attacks again. The Paris Declaration laid plans for that commitment in January. Kyiv had a briefing from the Americans, and now the partners want a broad discussion of security and guarantees, Zelenskyy said. Brussels comes ahead of three-way talks with Russia, which the Kremlin says Putin is ready in principle to resume in mid-November.

Zelenskyy: meeting planned for Tuesday or Wednesday

The meeting is planned for Tuesday or Wednesday, 27 or 28 October, Zelenskyy said in the interview, aired on 25 October. The EU would take part at the presidential level and NATO at the level of its secretary general. He did not know whether anyone else would join. He also said Ukraine’s neutrality and limits on its army are not up for discussion.

After Oslo, Witkoff briefed Putin in St. Petersburg

Earlier, on 20 October, Zelenskyy met US special envoy Steve Witkoff in Oslo, with Finnish President Alexander Stubb and Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre present. According to Zelenskyy, a wider round there included national security advisers from Germany, the UK, France, and Italy, the chief of staff of the European Commission president, and NATO representatives.

A day later, Witkoff met Putin in St. Petersburg and said he had brought papers setting out possible paths to a settlement. He told Putin the Oslo talks had been productive. However, Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov claimed the new ideas from the Europeans and Kyiv that Witkoff relayed held little of use for a settlement.

The initiative will focus on resilient communications, navigation, and onboard autonomy, as Sine Engineering specializes in producing satellite-independent navigation software, enabling drones to fly without relying on GPS.

Finland will donate diesel locomotives to Ukraine’s state railway, the Office of Ukraine’s President reported. Helsinki also pledged new winter aid, and the two countries signed deals on drones, housing, and satellite communications during Finnish Prime Minister Petteri Orpo’s visit to Kyiv. One of them is a first step toward a satellite link Ukraine would control itself.

With Russia replacing its missiles as fast as it fires them, Ukraine heads into winter needing equipment that works without the grid. Russian strikes have damaged or destroyed almost 600 locomotives of Ukraine’s state railway since the full-scale invasion began, more than 300 of them diesels, the infrastructure minister said. The attacks have reached engines even near the Polish border, on the railway that carries Ukraine’s evacuations, grain, and cargo.

Diesels that keep moving when the grid goes down

Finland will hand 10 locomotives and their spare parts to Ukrzaliznytsia, Ukraine’s state railway, free of charge. Infrastructure Minister Mykola Kalashnyk announced the deal, signed on 22 October at a Ukrainian-Finnish business forum. The engines need no power from overhead lines, so trains can keep running during blackouts.

The engines are Dv12 diesels that VR, Finland’s state rail company, is taking out of service. A VR shareholders’ meeting moved them into state ownership, and the Finnish state is donating them, Yle reported. VR puts their value, spare parts included, at about €2.1 million. Finland’s government said the gift will not affect VR’s ability to run trains at home.

Ukrainian Prime Minister Serhii Koretskyi and Orpo signed the donation certificate, one of seven documents signed that day. Two others plan Ukrainian-Finnish drone production in Finland, one for military and dual-use systems and one for heavy drones. Another covers a precast concrete plant for industrial housing construction.

The day’s agreements are worth around €300 million in total, Zelenskyy said. Projects worth €200 million are already under way within the two countries’ Drone Deal, he added. Under an earlier plan, most drones made in Finland would go to Ukraine.

Winter money now, a 36th military package by year’s end

Orpo announced a new €10 million package. Of it, €5 million goes to the Ukraine Energy Support Fund and €2 million to humanitarian aid for winter. The last €3 million goes to the Ukraine Recovery Program, for energy and water supply. Finland will also deliver mobile heating containers by December.

Finland has given Ukraine five defense packages this year, worth more than €500 million combined, Militarnyi reported. A 36th package is being prepared together with Ukraine’s military. “We plan to make a decision by the end of this year,” Orpo said. In September, Finland approved a package worth about €290 million.

A satellite link Ukraine would own

Ukraine’s Defense Ministry signed a letter of intent with Finnish satellite firm ICEYE and telecom company Nokia, Militarnyi reported, citing ICEYE. The parties will explore building a secure satellite communications system under Ukraine’s control. The aim is to reduce Ukraine’s dependence on foreign commercial operators.

In this model, the state customer owns the satellites, ground stations, and user terminals, RBC-Ukraine reported. The network could serve defense, border protection, emergency services, and disaster recovery. The letter sets out no timeline or funding.

“Modern warfare has proven that reliable communications are a matter of national security,” Zelenskyy said in the companies’ statement. ICEYE CEO Rafal Modrzewski said Ukraine needs “secure, sovereign and high-performance satellite communications systems that it controls.”

The deal comes after a speed cap on Starlink disrupted Ukrainian drone missions this month. The EU, meanwhile, is pushing three European firms to merge into one SpaceX rival. ICEYE has supplied Ukraine with radar satellite imagery for years.

Days before the signing, tracking firm LeoLabs said a Russian government-owned satellite, Cosmos 2612, had spent weeks shadowing an ICEYE radar satellite, coming within 500 meters. The ICEYE satellite is widely believed to provide imagery to Ukraine.

Neither fix is quick. Ukraine’s big locomotive order arrives from 2027, and the first satellites of the ICEYE-Nokia system are expected to launch only in 2028.

Ukraine's defense minister raised the urgent need for Patriot interceptors with Sweden on 22 October, the Defense Ministry reported. The same day, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy warned of more Russian ballistic strikes and blamed US supply cuts.

Patriots are Ukraine's main defense against Russian ballistic missiles, and their deliveries keep shrinking. Figures Zelenskyy released in August showed Patriot interceptor deliveries falling from 675 in 2023 to 364 in 2025, with 264 projected for 2026. Europe holds enough PAC-2 and PAC-3 interceptors for Ukraine's minimum winter needs, Zelenskyy told journalists on 16 October, but he did not yet know how many Europe would hand over, Ukrainska Pravda reported.

Partners' stocks now, Ukraine's missiles later

Russia fired 21 ballistic missiles at Kyiv overnight on 22 October, Zelenskyy said. Defense Minister Yevhenii Khmara told his Swedish counterpart, Pål Jonson, that Ukraine must counter ballistic threats as fast as possible, in particular with Patriot interceptors.

The ministry's readout says Ukraine has Patriot missiles under contract. It also says Kyiv asks partners to transfer interceptors from their stocks in exchange for future deliveries allocated to Ukraine.

Khmara made the same request at the Ukraine Defense Contact Group meeting on 8 September. He said then that Ukraine was contracting about 1,000 Patriot missiles with partners' help and an EU loan, but they would arrive only in the coming years, LB reported. He asked allies for missiles from their stocks now, in exchange for future upgraded missiles under Ukraine's contracts.

"Only when the American side approves it"

Zelenskyy spoke to journalists before meeting Finnish Prime Minister Petteri Orpo, Ukrinform reported. He said the Americans had reduced supplies and Russia would step up ballistic attacks.

"Europeans can provide the missiles only when the American side approves it," Zelenskyy said.

He said the US had sent most of its interceptors to the Middle East.

On 19 October, Zelenskyy told US senators that US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth was not signing off on Patriot deliveries allies had already paid for. Axios obtained the call transcript from Ukrainian officials. A US government official told the Kyiv Independent that Ukrainian officials' claims that Hegseth was holding up the missiles were "not true."

Washington says nothing has changed. "We have our own needs, too," Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on 20 October, but there is "nothing being deliberately denied to Ukraine." Hegseth told reporters in Eau Claire, Wisconsin, that the US had not changed its posture toward Ukraine, "but certainly with things like interceptors, we want to make sure our guys have the most possible as well."

Show features live chat sessions with breeders, a podcast and updates on dogs’ progress from birth to weigh-ins

A 24-hour Finnish TV show dedicated entirely to the live progress of a dog and her six newborn puppies is drawing millions of viewers.

As well as a 24-hour webcam, Pentulive (Puppy Live) includes live evening chat sessions with the dogs’ breeder, a podcast and an instant notification service that updates followers on the puppies’ progress – from their birth to weigh-ins and first nail trims – for eight weeks.

Continue reading...

© Photograph: Julia Kiiskinen/Yle - The Finnish Broadcasting Company/AP

© Photograph: Julia Kiiskinen/Yle - The Finnish Broadcasting Company/AP

© Photograph: Julia Kiiskinen/Yle - The Finnish Broadcasting Company/AP

"Ukraine needs secure, sovereign, and high-performance satellite communications systems that it controls," ICEYE CEO Rafal Modrzewski said in a press release announcing the deal with Kyiv.

The hardest part of ending Russia's war is making sure it cannot start it again. As the peace talks have escalated ahead of the US elections, Ukraine is weighing three options for its postwar security.

Among them are NATO membership, direct US guarantees modeled on NATO’s Article 5, and a European “Coalition of the Willing” backed by Washington, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy says, according to UNIAN. But none of them have been agreed to yet.

Zelenskyy describes the guarantees as a single package, with each layer still under discussion with partners. All of it, he says, rests on a strong Ukrainian army, in both numbers and quality.

Three guarantees, none of them signed

Everyone counts on NATO, Zelenskyy says, but Kyiv is also negotiating direct guarantees from the US, including an Article 5-style collective-defense clause, alongside the European Coalition of the Willing that would act together with Washington. The arithmetic, he said, is already done.

“Our colleagues in Europe and America know this. We have already calculated everything: both the financing and the corresponding number of our soldiers, so that our state can be at peace,” he states.

Why Zelenskyy says even Russia should want Ukraine in NATO

He went further, arguing that NATO membership would serve not only Ukraine and the Alliance but also Russia.

“I think, honestly, the Russians need our accession to NATO too, because for them that is more security than Ukraine outside NATO,” he claims.

The talks come as Washington pushes toward negotiations. Zelenskyy says he expects signals from US Secretary of State Marco Rubio within a day or two, as well as a call with envoy Steve Witkoff. He adds that Jared Kushner, on his way to Kyiv in November, told him Russia supports a trilateral meeting of the US, Ukraine, and Russia, at the level of technical teams.

"The main purpose of the visit is to show Finland's strong support for Ukraine as the war of aggression continues and the country prepares for the winter," the Finnish government said.

Company ordered to stop work at two sites in country, which has found itself at forefront of tech firms’ latest push

Behind a wire fence lies a vast gaping wound of earth. Before Google’s arrival a few months ago, an estimated quarter of a million trees occupied the 330 hectares (815 acres) of forest near the town of Muhos in rural northern Finland. Now they are all gone.

After the tech company illegally stripped the entire area to build a datacentre – taking even the top soil with it – all that remains is a vast expanse of mud indented with the trail marks of machinery, puddles and mounds of earth, roots and branches. Residents say that brown water flowing off the site is going into a stream that feeds the Oulujoki River.

Continue reading...

© Photograph: Alessandro Rampazzo/AFP/Getty Images

© Photograph: Alessandro Rampazzo/AFP/Getty Images

© Photograph: Alessandro Rampazzo/AFP/Getty Images

The latest rift with President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine serves as a reminder that President Trump readily lashes out at other world leaders, only to grow outraged if they fight back.

© Alex Kent/The New York Times