Newsletter: Drone crisis talks in Lithuania as Russia steps up Kyiv threats

By Mared Gwyn Jones Published on 26/05/2026 - 8:29 GMT+2•Updated 8:30 Share Comments Share Facebook Twitter Flipboard Send Reddit Linkedin Messenger Telegram VK Bluesky Threads Whatsapp

Also in this newsletter: Pope Leo weighs in on the AI.race, and Belarus's opposition leader Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya slams President Aliaksandr Lukashenka's willingness to "sacrifice" Belarus's "sovereignty" to stay in power.

Good morning from a scorching Brussels. I’m Mared Gwyn.

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Just in: Belarus’s opposition leader Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya has told Euronews that “democratic Belarus is with Ukraine” and that President Aliaksandr Lukashenka is willing to sacrifice Belarus’s “independence and sovereignty to stay in power”. Watch.

Tsikhanouskaya spoke from Kyiv, which over the weekend was targeted by an Oreshnik missile in what was one of Russia’s biggest attacks in the war to date. More on that below.

But we start today with the drone crisis rocking the Baltic nations – with European Commission boss Ursula von der Leyen and defence chief Andrius Kubilius in Lithuania today for talks with the Lithuanian and Estonian Presidents after vowing a strong and united response to a series of recent drone incursions.

Last Wednesday, a drone alert ground Lithuania’s capital, Vilnius, to a halt and saw people rush for shelter in bunkers. It was the fourth such incursion on Europe’s eastern flank in two weeks, with a NATO jet shooting down a drone over Estonia days earlier.

The drones are believed to be Ukrainian in origin but diverted off course by Russia and sent into European airspace. According to drone experts and security officials, drones knocked off course by electronic jamming are significantly more difficult to intercept and pose a bigger risk to the civilian population.

But beyond the security, economic and social risks of this uptick in incursions, the drone crisis is also threatening the political stability of these nations. Latvia’s government collapsed earlier this month when Prime Minister Evika Silina fired her defence minister over repeated failures in air defence systems.

The Baltic nations say Russia is sowing chaos and threatening to undermine support for Ukraine in countries which have long been Kyiv’s staunchest allies.

It’s also piling pressure on Brussels to step up to the plate.

The Commission’s chief spokesperson said today’s visit aims to “stress” EU support for strengthening the Baltics’ defences and ensuring “closer cooperation” in response to threats. But, three months after the Commission unveiled an action plan to support countries to beef up counter-drone security, the continued entry of stray drones into European skies is raising questions about the efficiency and speed of the initiatives.

Also today, EU affairs ministers are gathering in Brussels to discuss the next EU budget, relations with the United Kingdom and preparations for the June summit of leaders, which is shaping up to be consequential, Jorge Liboreiro writes in.

Ahead of the meeting, 16 countries known as the “Friends of Cohesion” have called for an ambitious long-term budget which puts an emphasis on the EU’s regional and agricultural funding programmes.

Another topic on the agenda will be enlargement. Cyprus, the current EU Council presidency, hopes to open the first cluster of negotiation with Ukraine and Moldova before it passes the baton to Ireland on 1 July. The step, as you know, is still under Hungary’s veto. But hopes are rising after the new government in Budapest launched formal talks with Kyiv to discuss the issue of the Hungarian minority in western Ukraine. “We’re working very hard,” said a senior official. “We really want to have the first cluster open, yesterday if we could.”

Meanwhile, other candidate countries continue to march ahead. At the end of Tuesday’s meeting, an accession conference with Albania will take place to confirm its progress under the first cluster, known as Fundamentals. Albania is, after Montenegro, considered the most advanced candidate.

And finally, a look ahead to the rest of this week, with European Commissioners set to gather to brainstorm ideas on how to deal with China’s aggressive trade policies on Friday.

France, Italy, Spain, the Netherlands and Lithuania are pushing Brussels to toughen its trade defences against partners “imposing new trade barriers or contributing to systemic and structural industrial overcapacity”, according to a non-paper seen by Euronews' Peggy Corlin.

The document called for safeguards — including tariffs and quotas — to tackle “sector-wide trade disruptions”, as well as investigations into unfair practices such as dumping and unfair subsidies targeting specific products. It also urges the European Commission to strengthen its trade-defence teams – which currently employs around 140 officials – and to integrate economic security considerations into the assessment of the Union’s interest within the trade-defence toolbox.

But divisions remain within the bloc. Germany did not endorse the document and over the weekend, Spain toned down its participation in the French-led initiative. “We support a balanced approach based on added value, economic openness and the guarantee of secure, diversified and resilient supply chains,” a Spanish government official said.

Russia threatens Ukraine with ‘systemic’ strikes on Kyiv, urges foreign nationals and diplomats to evacuate

Moscow has threatened Kyiv with “systemic” aerial attacks, just 48 hours after it hit Ukraine’s capital with 600 drones and 90 missiles, including 30 ballistic missiles and an Oreshnik intermediate-range ballistic missile (IRBM), our Ukraine correspondent Sasha Vakulina writes.

“We advise foreign nationals, including staff of diplomatic missions and representatives of international organisations, to leave the city,” the Russian foreign ministry said.

In a phone call with the US Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Monday, Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said his country would start “systemic strikes” on sites in Kyiv which Moscow alleges are used by the Ukrainian Armed Forces, and urged American citizens to leave the Ukrainian capital.

The US-based Institute for the Study of War said Russia damaged government buildings and cultural sites in Kyiv, as the Kremlin threatened it would if Ukraine struck Moscow’s May 9 Victory Day celebrations – which Ukraine did not do.

Meanwhile, the Russian President Vladimir Putin has officially signed a bill effectively allowing him to invade foreign countries under the guise of "protection of Russian citizens" abroad.

It came on the same day that Russia's Foreign Ministry said it would turn to the UN's court in The Hague over alleged discrimination of Russian minorities in the Baltic countries.

According to the State Duma documents, the "bill was drafted to protect the rights of Russian citizens in the event of their arrest, detention, criminal or other prosecution pursuant to decisions of foreign courts vested with criminal jurisdiction by other foreign states without Russia’s participation.”

Russian lawmakers have framed the legislation as part of an effort to "counter the campaign of rampant Russophobia that continues abroad.”

Putin used a false argument of "protecting Russian-speaking population and Russian citizens" for both of his invasions of Ukraine starting from 2014 in eastern Ukraine and the unilateral annexation of Crimea.

Pope Leo XIV warns of 'new forms of slavery' linked to Artificial Intelligence

In his highly-anticipated first encyclical, titled "Magnifica Humanitas", Pope Leo XIV has warned about the "new forms of slavery" and “culture of power” driving the AI race, framing the way the technology is regulated as key for humanity’s future.

"If technology promises emancipation, yet produces new forms of global subordination, it stands in contradiction to the fundamental principle of human dignity. The fight against new forms of slavery is a decisive test for the ethical discernment of AI," the Pope wrote.

The pontiff also called for AI to be "disarmed" and made "human-friendly", and stated it is “not permissible” for lethal military decisions to be taken using the technology – a move that pits him once again against the Trump administration, which is pushing for AI deregulation.

Pope Leo’s spectacular encyclical and intervention was made even more impactful by the appearance of the co-founder of AI company Anthropic, Chris Olah, at the presentation, where he warned AI could cause mass job losses and called for the technology to be steered by figures outside Big Tech – including religious leaders.

He added that if AI displaces labour in the way he expects, “supporting those displaced will be a moral imperative of historic proportions”.

Jeremy Fisayo-Bambihas more.

More from our newsrooms

Lithuania warns mass data leak was work of foreign country. Lithuanian authorities are on high alert for cyber attacks after a massive data leak involving more than 600,000 entries from national data registers, which the government says is believed to be the work of another country. Andrew Naughtie has more.

US military says it has launched new strikes in Iran, including on missile launch sites. According to a statement from the US Central Command, the strikes were carried out “to protect our troops from threats posed by Iranian forces". Jeremy Fisayo-Bambi has more.

Turkey’s Erdoğan scraps move to close liberal Bilgi University following outcry. The decision to close the private, liberal university in Istanbul had sparked demonstrations and a fierce backlash, with opponents linking the move to an authoritarian drift in Turkey. Burcu Basaran and Gavin Blackburn have the details.

We're also keeping an eye on

• EU affairs ministers gather in Brussels. On the agenda: the EU’s long-term budget, enlargement and the EU-UK relationship.
• EU holds 8th inter-governmental accession conference with Albania.
• European Parliament President Roberta Metsola is in Silicon Valley on a two-day trip to talk tech, trade and transatlantic cooperation.That's it for today. Peggy Corlin, Jorge Liboreiro and Sasha Vakulina contributed to this newsletter.

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Europe Today: Von der Leyen heads to Lithuania, condemns Russia as Baltic tensions rise

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Newsletter: Drone crisis talks in Lithuania as Russia steps up Kyiv threats

• European Commission
• Ursula von der Leyen
• Drones