Ukrainian fears grow as Trump threatens Europe with humiliation

This week, as the war in Ukraine took a dramatic turn, we welcomed Sasha Dovzhyk to the Guardian offices. Sasha is director of Index, a new institution in Lviv devoted to the documentation of the war. Sasha spoke movingly about Ukrainians’ hopes and fears after three years of war – including the situation for those living under the terror of occupation, with daily threats to life and safety from the Russian authorities.

She was in London for the launch of a book she helped bring together after its author, the brilliant Ukrainian novelist Victoria Amelina, was killed in a Russian missile attack before she was able to complete the manuscript. Margaret Atwood introduced our extract from this important book, and Charlotte Higgins’s review is in today’s magazine.

Also this week, Shaun Walker had an exclusive interview with Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Kyiv. In it, the Ukrainian president made it clear that Europe would not have the means to guarantee his nation’s security if the US were to withdraw defence support.

Not long after we published Zelenskyy’s words, new US defence secretary Pete Hegseth was in Brussels telling his European counterparts they would have to take the lead in defending Ukraine and that the US would no longer prioritise Europe’s safety. That was just the entree for an even bigger shift: Donald Trump announcing he’d agreed to begin negotiations with Vladimir Putin to broker a ceasefire.

It was another seismic geopolitical moment in the nascent days of the second Trump era. And it was “precisely what Putin had been waiting for”, according to the experts and insiders our Russian affairs correspondent Pjotr Sauer spoke to. Global affairs correspondent Andrew Roth wrote that Trump “does not care who controls the blood-soaked soils of east Ukraine, so long as he can access the rare earth minerals that lie beneath” while Patrick Wintour gauged the scale of Europe’s diplomatic humiliation as the Munich security conference began. Shaun Walker and Artem Mazhulin spoke to those on the ground in Kyiv, where reaction ranged from feelings of betrayal to grim relief the war may at least be ending.

Columnist and Europe expert Timothy Garton Ash was left flabbergasted by the dire consequences of Trump’s decision, writing that his “appeasement of Vladimir Putin makes Neville Chamberlain look like a principled, courageous realist”.

We’re entering a critical new stage for Ukraine, Europe and the Middle East as the world reorientates to Trump’s second presidency. Our live blogs remain essential in keeping up with the latest developments, while our correspondents and experts are committed to explaining how these overlapping stories are shaping the world for our readers and revealing their human impact on the ground.

As the Israeli-Gaza ceasefire teetered, Malak A Tantesh and Julian Borger reported on the uncertainty felt by Palestinians in the territory about their future after Trump’s bizarre plan to “own Gaza”. Emma Graham-Harrison and Quique Kierszenbaum reported on the Israeli raids on a well-known Palestinian bookshop in occupied East Jerusalem, viewed by rights groups and intellectuals as a deliberate attempt “to create a culture of fear”.

Our data and visuals journalists teamed up with economics correspondent Richard Partington to unpack what Trump’s tariffs will mean for global trade in this essential set of charts explaining the wider consequences of a trade war.

Australia and Chelsea football superstar Sam Kerr was found not guilty of racially aggravated harassment in London this week. Sammy Gecsoyler covered the trial and wrote about the aftermath of a drunken night that led to the court case and revealed complex questions of race, power and privilege. Kieran Pender asked what the case – that many believe shouldn’t have gone to trial – will do to the reputation of the Matildas’ “shining star”. And our women’s football correspondent Suzanne Wrack wrote a powerful opinion piece about the fear felt by any woman who finds herself locked in a taxi, as Kerr was.

Thames Water, the UK’s biggest water supplier, is on the brink after years of mismanagement, pollution, fines and dividend extraction. Jasper Jolly looked at the giant financial institutions scrapping over its carcass and getting huge fees in the process. The water regulator Ofwat also confirmed it was investigating Thames’s decision to delay 100 environmental improvement schemes, after the Guardian revealed that it intentionally diverted millions of pounds pledged for these projects towards bonuses and dividends.

Progress towards the landmark legalisation of assisted dying in England and Wales took a major twist this week as Jessica Elgot revealed that plans for each case to obtain signoff from a high court judge are set to be ditched. Debate on the rights and wrongs of that decision continues, with some warning that support for the law is ebbing away.

In the latest of their investigations into gambling companies, the Observer’s Shanti Das and Jon Ungoed-Thomas revealed that betting firms are secretly sharing users’ data with Facebook without permission.

In Saturday magazine, Jenny Kleeman met Noland Arbaugh, who was left quadriplegic after a swimming accident in 2016. In 2024, Noland became the first human recipient of a chip developed by Elon Musk’s Neuralink that allows him to move things with his mind.

With Britain’s housing crisis showing no sign of abating, Aditya Chakrabortty wrote a powerful column about how Margaret Thatcher’s right-to-buy policy for council-owned homes in the 1980s enriched the private sector at taxpayers’ expense and is now proving a timebomb for 21st-century local governments.

When 25-year-old Laurence Marks was sent to cover the Moorgate train crash on the London Underground in 1975, he had no inkling it would be a day that would change his life for ever, or that he would later be recruited to investigate what led to the crash that killed 43 people, including his father.

There were wild scenes on Wednesday when Everton equalised with the last kick of the game against city rivals Liverpool in the last-ever derby at Everton’s 132-year-old Goodison Park. Jonathan Liew captured the moment, concluding: “There will always be a part of football that only madness can touch.” A few days before the derby, Everton fan Alexandra Topping wrote a beautiful, bittersweet piece about taking her son to his first (and last) game at the famous old ground, a glorious 4-0 win against Leicester.

One more thing …Kendrick Lamar’s half-time show at last weekend’s Super Bowl was one for the ages. If it didn’t quite topple Prince’s rain-soaked turn in 2007 as the best of all time, it was right up there in terms of artistry. Sam Wolfson’s review called it a “classy, intelligent set that chose artistry over easily meme-able moments” (though there were a few of those too) – while also noting the power and significance of Lamar’s symbolism with Trump in attendance. It was hard to disagree.

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