Keir Starmer has said he believes Ukraine will win the war against Russia as he ended his final visit to the country while in office. Starmer met Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Kyiv on Thursday and told Sky News in an interview: \u201cI believe Ukraine will win this war.\u201d He added: \u201cWhat they\u2019ve shown is that it\u2019s not just the size of your army, it\u2019s how you fight a modern conflict. And so they are probably the most effective fighting machine in Europe.\u201d<\/p>\n
Starmer\u2019s visit came on his final full day as Labour leader, with the British leader saying the handover would not change the relationship between the two nations. \u201cThe fact that there will be a new prime minister in the United Kingdom, in the days to come, doesn\u2019t change that dynamic at all,\u201d he said. \u201cThe resolve of the United Kingdom remains the same, it will not waver.\u201d<\/p>\n
Starmer also announced 300 million-euro funding to help deliver a squadron of 16 advanced Swedish Gripen jets to Ukraine by 2029. The Gripen aircraft can be used for air-to-air combat, ground strikes and reconnaissance missions.<\/p>\n
Zelenskyy defended on Thursday his decision to dismiss the country\u2019s popular defence minister, Mykhailo Fedorov, and confirmed reports that relations had broken down between the ministry and the country\u2019s top army leadership. His decision to back the commander of Ukraine\u2019s armed forces Gen Oleksandr Syrskyi has outraged civil society<\/a>. More than 1,000 protesters gathered outside the presidential office in Kyiv on Thursday, carrying placards in support of Fedorov. Ukraine\u2019s youthful defence minister was seen as an innovator of the country\u2019s successful drone technology but was someone who clashed with the traditional military establishment.<\/p>\n The personnel overhaul, which included replacing the prime minister, could become a test of Zelenskyy\u2019s political authority as Ukraine\u2019s fight against Russia\u2019s full-scale invasion approaches four and a half years. Zelenskyy has remained in office under martial law because wartime elections are prohibited but has periodically reshuffled his government.<\/p>\n Russian and Ukrainian attacks \u2060on civilian areas in towns and cities, killed \u2060at \u200bleast 12 people on Thursday, local officials said. A Russian guided bomb attack on Ukraine\u2019s southeastern city \u2060of Zaporizhzhia killed three people and wounded 15. Russian missiles struck \u200cthe Black Sea port of Odesa, killing two people and injuring six. Outside Kharkiv, near the Russian border, a Russian drone attack killed one person. Earlier \u200cin the day, a drone attack near the city of Kupiansk, farther east, killed three people, while one person was killed in Donetsk \u200bregion.<\/p>\n On the other side of the \u200bborder, local officials \u200bin Belgorod Region said one \u200bperson had died when Ukrainian forces shelled \u200ba settlement near the \u200cborder.<\/p>\n