India's Modi pledges to do 'whatever we can' to end Ukraine war at G7 Zelenskyy meeting

Prime Minister Narendra Modi said India will do “whatever we can” to resolve the Ukraine crisis when he met Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on the sidelines of the G7 summit in Japan for the first time since the start of the Russian invasion last year.

“I understand your pain and the pain of Ukrainian citizens very well,” Mr Modi said.

“I can assure you that to resolve this India and, me personally, will do whatever we can do.”

India has so far refrained from outright criticism of Russia's invasion.

A post on Mr Zelenskyy's Telegram account said he had “thanked India for supporting the territorial integrity and sovereignty of our country, in particular at the sites of international organisations” and also for humanitarian support.

Mr Zelenskyy was only expected to address the meeting of the wealthiest democracies by video but flew in on a French diplomatic plane to hold a series of meetings with leaders including US President Joe Biden.

The meetings came as the US publicly stated its support for Ukrainian pilots training on F-16 fighters with the aim of providing the newer jets to replace Kyiv's losses and their Soviet-era aircraft.

The Ukrainian leader met separately with Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and then British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, who he embraced warmly.

On Telegram, Mr Zelenskyy said he had thanked Mr Sunak “for the UK's leadership in the international fighter jet coalition”.

Mr Zelenskyy will meet Mr Biden in Hiroshima to discuss “practical implementation” of the plan to train pilots on the F-16 jets. The US President was “looking forward” to the talks, the White House said, without confirming a date.

It comes after Russian troops made gains in eastern Ukraine, with Moscow claiming that it had taken the city of Bakhmut amid fierce fighting.

Russian President Vladimir Putin late on Saturday congratulated the Wagner mercenary group and the national army on their claimed capture of the city, according to a Kremlin statement quoted by Russian news agencies.

“Vladimir Putin congratulated the assault units of Wagner as well as all servicemen of units of the Russian armed forces who provided them with the necessary support and flank cover, on the completion of the operation to liberate Artemovsk [the Soviet-era name for Bakhmut],” the TASS news agency quoted the Kremlin as saying.

Biden to have 'direct engagement' with Zelenskyy

US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said that Mr Biden and Mr Zelenskyy would have direct engagement at the summit.

The G7 called on China to put pressure on Russia to end the war, Japan's Kyodo news agency reported. The bloc seeks peaceful co-operation with Beijing as EU states and the US seek to establish their own footing with China, it added.

They also agreed to preserve financial stability and growth, called for a peaceful end to tensions over Taiwan and discussed the creation of a body to “deter” economic “coercion”, Kyodo said.

However, from afar Russia's Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said the G7 summit's decisions were aimed at creating a “double containment” of Russia and China.

World leaders faced a high-stakes balancing act at the G7 in Hiroshima as they looked to address a series of global worries demanding urgent attention.

Ukraine is just one issue on the agenda for the weekend of talks, alongside climate change, artificial intelligence, poverty and economic instability, and nuclear proliferation.

They agreed on the need to govern generative AI but not the substance of what that might look like.

China, the world's second largest economy, sits at the nexus of many of those broad concerns.

There is increasing anxiety in Asia that Beijing, which has been steadily building up its nuclear weapons programme, could try to seize Taiwan by force, sparking a wider conflict.

China claims the self-governing island as its own and regularly sends ships and warplanes near it.

The G7 leaders issued a statement warning that China’s “accelerating build-up of its nuclear arsenal without transparency [or] meaningful dialogue poses a concern to global and regional stability”.

“We do seek to co-operate with China on matters of mutual interest,” Mr Sullivan said of the statement. “We will work to address our significant concerns that we have with China in a range of areas.”

North Korea, which has been testing missiles at a great pace in an attempt to perfect a nuclear programme meant to target the mainland US, must completely abandon its nuclear bomb ambitions, the leaders' statement said, “including any further nuclear tests or launches that use ballistic missile technology”.

North Korea cannot and will never have the status of a nuclear weapon state under international nuclear treaties, it said.

Approval for training Ukrainian pilots on the F-16 is the latest shift by the Biden administration as it moves to arm Kyiv with more advanced weaponry, following decisions to send rocket launcher systems and Abrams tanks.

The US has insisted that it is sending weapons to Ukraine to defend itself and it has discouraged attacks on Russian territory.

“We’ve reached a moment where it is time to look down the road again to say what is Ukraine going to need as part of a future force, to be able to deter and defend against Russian aggression as we go forward,” Mr Sullivan said.

An EU official said Mr Zelenskyy will take part in two separate sessions on Sunday.

The first will be with G7 members only and will focus on the war in Ukraine. The second session will include the G7 and other nations invited to take part in the summit. That will focus on “peace and stability”.

The G7 leaders have rolled out a new wave of global sanctions on Moscow as well as plans to enhance the effectiveness of existing financial penalties meant to constrain President Vladimir Putin’s war effort.

Russia is now world's most sanctioned country, but there are questions about the effectiveness of the measures.

“Our support for Ukraine will not waver,” the G7 leaders said in a statement released after closed-door meetings. They vowed, “to stand together against Russia’s illegal, unjustifiable and unprovoked war of aggression against Ukraine”.

“Russia started this war and can end this war,” they said.

Mr Zelenskyy has repeatedly called for western fighter jets to bolster his country’s defences.

As Ukraine has tried to improve its air defences with a host of western-supplied anti-aircraft systems and prepares to launch a counteroffensive against Russia, officials believe the jets could become essential to the country’s long-term security.

The US’s decisions on when, how many and who will provide the fourth-generation F-16 fighter jets will be made in the months ahead while the training is under way, Mr Biden told leaders.

The G7 includes Japan, the US, the UK, France, Germany, Canada and Italy, as well as the EU.

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