Russia-Ukraine war live: US House speaker negotiates with White House over wartime funding for Ukraine

Ukrainian emergency service workers put out a fire after a Russian attack on the Trypilska thermal power plant, Ukrainka, Kyiv region.

LIVE – Updated at 08:55

Speaker Mike Johnson has delayed aid for Ukraine for months in effort to include Republican demands in package.

US House speaker in talks with White House on advancing Ukraine aid

08:55

After months of delay, a top House Republican said the US House speaker is negotiating with the White House on advancing wartime funding for Ukraine – a package that would deviate from the Senate’s $95bn foreign security package and include several Republican demands, the Associated Press is reporting.

House Speaker Mike Johnson has been facing mounting pressure regarding a Ukraine aid package, not just from Joe Biden, who has repeatedly chastised Republicans for not helping Ukraine, but from hard-right members of Johnson’s conference who remain staunchly opposed to additional Ukraine aid.

“There’s been no agreement reached,” House Republican leader Steve Scalise told reporters on Thursday. “Obviously there would have to be an agreement reached not just with the White House, but with our own members.”

Johnson is set to travel to Mar-a-Lago club in Florida on Friday to meet with Donald Trump – who has said he would negotiate an end to the conflict as he tries to push the US to a more isolationist stance. Johnson has purportedly been consulting Trump in recent weeks on the Ukraine funding to gain his support — or at least prevent him from openly opposing the package.

Some of this aid may include sending money to Kyiv as a loan or redirecting Russian assets seized under the Rebuilding Economic Prosperity and Opportunity (Repo) for Ukrainians Act – a departure from previous aid packages sent to Ukraine. Even still, aid opponents like congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia are unlikely to be swayed. Greene has threatened to try to oust Johnson as speaker and warned that advancing funding for Ukraine would help build her case that GOP lawmakers should select a new speaker.

“This becomes a more dangerous world with Russia in Kyiv,” said congressman Don Bacon, a Republican who supports aiding Ukraine. “So we’re just got to find a the smart way to get a bill passed that we can get out and back to the Senate.”

Opening summary

08:29

Good morning. The US House speaker is negotiating with the White House on advancing wartime funding for Ukraine and Israel, the Associated Press is reporting.

Speaker Mike Johnson has delayed for months on advancing desperately needed aid to Ukraine, in an effort to include some politically advantageous Republican demands in the package – as well as due to pressure from some hard-right Republicans aligned with Donald Trump.

Yesterday, Japans’s prime minister, Fumio Kishida, called on Americans to overcome their “self-doubt” and referenced the war in Ukraine. “Without US support, how long before the hopes of Ukraine would collapse under the onslaught from Moscow?” Kishida asked.

More on that in a bit.

Here is a roundup of the other big stories:

Ukraine’s parliament passed a controversial bill on Thursday that will change the rules on civilian military mobilisation in an effort to address fledgling manpower among its forces. The legislation, which must be signed by the president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, is seen as crucial for Ukraine to address what military analysts say are major manpower problems as it fights a better armed and larger foe.

Russian forces outnumber Ukrainian troops seven to ten times in eastern regions, Ukraine’s Gen Yuriy Sodol told parliament on Thursday. “The enemy outnumbers us by 7-10 times, we lack manpower,” said Sodol, who is commanding the troops in Kharkiv, Donetsk and Luhansk regions in eastern Ukraine.

Russian missiles and drones destroyed a large electricity plant near Kyiv and hit power facilities in several regions of Ukraine on Thursday, officials said. The major attack destroyed the Trypilska coal-powered thermal power plant near the capital, a senior official at the company that runs the facility told Reuters.

The mass use of “drop-and-forget” guided bombs containing foreign components is driving Russian advances in Ukraine, with up to 500 now being fired a week, according to a Ukrainian government analysis. High explosive and cluster bombs fitted with “UMPC” guiding systems with a range of 40-60km (25-37 miles) are now said to be a central threat on the frontline, forcing back Ukrainian forces.

Ukraine and Latvia signed a bilateral security agreement, Volodymyr Zelenskiy announced during a visit to Vilnius. Zelenskiy said: “It envisages Latvia’s annual military support for Ukraine at 0.25% of GDP. Latvia also made a 10-year commitment to assist Ukraine with cyber defence, demining, and unmanned technologies, as well as support for Ukraine’s EU and Nato accession.”

Drone attacks on the Russian-held Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant in Ukraine must stop as they could pose “a new and gravely dangerous” stage in the war, the UN nuclear watchdog chief, said on Thursday, Reuters reported. Moscow and Kyiv have repeatedly accused each other of targeting the plant since Russia seized it weeks after invading Ukraine. Both countries requested an emergency meeting of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA)‘s board after an attack on Sunday. “It is of paramount importance to ensure these reckless attacks do not mark the beginning of a new and gravely dangerous front of the war,” IAEA director general Rafael Grossi said, adding: “Strikes must cease.”