A meeting between Donald Trump and Volodymyr Zelensky descended into bitter chaos, with Mr Trump saying afterwards that Ukraine’s president was “not ready for peace”. Mr Zelensky left the White House early and abandoned a planned signing of a deal giving America access to Ukraine’s rare minerals. In a heated exchange in the Oval Office, Mr Trump said that Mr Zelensky was “in no position to dictate” to him. America’s president said that he was “in the middle” of the two sides, and “for both Ukraine and Russia”.
Russia launched a drone attack on Ukraine overnight, the country’s air force said. Three people were killed and seven injured in Donetsk, a city in the east, while strikes wounded civilians and damaged buildings in Sumy and Kharkiv, in the north. Ukraine’s energy infrastructure also came under heavy attack.
Pope Francis suffered a respiratory crisis—a bronchial spasm that caused him to inhale vomit and required “noninvasive” ventilation. The 88-year-old pontiff, who has long battled respiratory problems, has been in hospital with pneumonia for two weeks. The Vatican said that he “remained alert and aware”, but that it would take one or two days to determine how the incident affected his prognosis.
Anneliese Dodds, Britain’s international development minister, resigned over Sir Keir Starmer’s plan to fund a £6bn defence budget increase by slashing foreign aid. The move would cut aid spending from 0.5% to 0.3% of GNI. Ms Dodds accused Sir Keir of copying Mr Trump’s USAID cuts and warned it would harm Britain’s “reputation”.
The value of bitcoin plunged during early trading in Asia amid a deepening cryptocurrency sell-off. Bitcoin’s price has fallen by more than 25% since touching an all-time high of $109,241 on January 20th. Traders have been disappointed by Mr Trump’s inaction on cryptocurrency. The president had vowed to implement several pro-crypto policies.
Clashes with the police broke out in Athens as hundreds of thousands of Greeks rallied on the second anniversary of the country’s deadliest train crash, which killed 57 people near Tempi, in central Greece. A general strike halted air, sea and rail transport. Protesters accuse the government of a cover-up. Parliament will debate political responsibility for the disaster next week.
Citigroup, an American bank, mistakenly credited a client’s account with $81trn instead of $280 last April due to a manual input error, the Financial Times reported. The mistake, caught 90 minutes later, did not result in any funds leaving the bank. The incident raises concerns over the bank’s risk management practices. It has struggled to fix longstanding operational issues.
Word of the week: güero, a Spanish term used in Mexico and the United States to describe a white person, often affectionately. Read the full story.
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