Russia-Ukraine war live: IMF and Ukraine agree $15bn funding deal; US rejects China’s impartiality claim | Russia

The International Monetary Fund said on Tuesday it had reached a staff-level agreement with Ukraine for a four-year financing package worth about $15.6 billion, offering funds the country needs as it continues to defend against Russia’s invasion.

The agreement, which must still be ratified by the IMF’s board, takes into consideration Ukraine’s path to accession to the European Union after the war. The fund said its executive board was expected to discuss approval in the coming weeks.

“The overarching goals of the authorities’ program are to sustain economic and financial stability in circumstances of exceptionally high uncertainty, restore debt sustainability, and support Ukraine’s recovery on the path toward EU accession in the post-war period,” IMF official Gavin Gray said in a statement announcing the agreement.

If approved, as expected, the Ukraine program would be the IMF’s biggest loan to a country involved in an active conflict.

The fund last week changed a rule to allow new loan programs for countries facing “exceptionally high uncertainty”, without naming Ukraine.

Hello and welcome to today’s live coverage of the war in Ukraine with me, Helen Sullivan. I’ll be bringing you the latest as it happens.

The International Monetary Fund said on Tuesday it had reached a staff-level agreement with Ukraine for a four-year financing package worth about $15.6 billion, offering funds the country needs as it continues to defend against Russia’s invasion. If ratified by the IMF board, as expected, the Ukraine program would be the IMF’s biggest loan to a country involved in an active conflict.

And White House national security council spokesperson John Kirby said the US does not see China as capable of being an impartial mediator between Moscow and Kyiv over the war in Ukraine, in the most direct criticism yet of China’s aim to be a middleman in efforts to end the war.

“I don’t think you can reasonably look at China as impartial in any way,” he said.

We’ll have more on these two stories shortly. In the meantime, here are the other key recent developments:

• Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin have met for a second day of talks at the Kremlin. The Chinese and Russian leaders signed a series of documents on a “strategic cooperation” after what Putin described as “successful and constructive” talks which showed that China-Russian relations were at the “highest point” in “the whole history of our two countries”. The Chinese president’s trip to Moscow has been viewed as a major boost for his strategic partner, Putin.

• Xi said China had an “impartial position” on the conflict in Ukraine and that it supported peace and dialogue, Russian state media reported. Xi said talks with his Russian counterpart had been “open and friendly”. Putin, speaking at the joint news conference, said Beijing’s proposal to end the Ukraine conflict could be the basis for a peaceful settlement – when the west is ready for it. Xi has invited Putin to visit China this year.

• Japan’s Fumio Kishida met Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, in Kyiv during a rare, unannounced visit by the Japanese leader. Kishida toured the town of Bucha, where civilians were killed by Russian forces. Kishida visited a church in the town outside Kyiv on Tuesday and said he was “outraged by the cruelty” as he paid his respects to the victims of Russian atrocities against civilians.

• Two Russian strategic bomber planes flew over the Sea of Japan for more than seven hours, the Russian defence ministry said on Tuesday in a statement released as Kishida’s Ukraine visit started.

• Putin has condemned a UK proposal to send ammunition that contains depleted uranium for use in Ukraine. If the UK supplies ammunition with depleted uranium to Ukraine, Russia will be forced to react, the Russian leader warned at his news conference with President Xi. A junior British defence minister said on Monday that the UK could supply “armour piercing rounds which contain depleted uranium” to Ukraine.

• Zelenskiy said Kyiv had suggested to China that it join a Ukrainian peace formula to end Russia’s war in his country. Zelenskiy, speaking during a joint press conference in Kyiv with Japan’s prime minister, Fumio Kishida, said Ukraine was still waiting for an answer from Beijing. He also said he would join an upcoming G7 summit in Japan via video link.

• Ukraine is holding its defence of the besieged eastern city of Bakhmut as Russian forces attempted to advance to the city centre, a Ukrainian general has said. There was intense fighting along the eastern frontline, Oleksandr Syrskyi, the commander of Ukrainian ground forces, said.

• Fifteen children have been returned from the Russian-occupied Ukrainian regions of Kharkiv and Kherson, as well as their mothers and children’s legal guardians, Ukraine’s human rights commissioner, Dmytro Lubinets, said. A total of 308 children have been returned to Ukraine since Russia’s full-scale invasion, he added, citing the country’s national information bureau.