UAE-Supplied Drones Still Target Civilians in Sudan Despite EU Condemnation

“It’s really the bare minimum to call out the actors involved … the EU should be doing a lot more,” said an expert.

By Mat Nashed , 

Truthout

July 28, 2026

A man stands in a crater filled with drone components on March 29, 2026, in el-Obeid, Sudan.Faiz Abubakr / Los Angeles Times via Getty Images

On July 9, the European Parliament passed a resolution that condemned the United Arab Emirates (UAE) for supporting a violent Sudanese paramilitary responsible for war crimes and other atrocities.

The resolution demanded urgent action to stop the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) from invading el-Obeid, a strategic city in central Sudan at risk of mass atrocities. It called for an end to all “external interference” — singling out the UAE — including the “financing, arms supply or other support” to the RSF.

“Of course, the UAE will be annoyed,” said one European diplomat, who was not authorized to comment on the record, to Truthout. “But they are accustomed to dealing with PR issues. Over the last three years, they have been dealing with a lot of PR issues [regarding their role] in Sudan.”

Since Sudan’s civil war erupted in April 2023, the UAE has provided diplomatic and military support to the RSF, which is at war with the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF), the national army.

Both the RSF and SAF have committed harrowing abuses such as summary executions and torture. The RSF has also subjected women and girls to systemic sexual violence and perpetrated crimes that “constitute distinct markers of genocide,” according to a recent United Nations probe.

In Sudan, Perpetrators of War Crimes Are Rewarded While Civilians Languish
War criminals, tyrants, and their enablers have rarely faced consequences, helping maintain a cycle of abuses. By Mat Nashed , Truthout June 3, 2026

Due to the RSF’s brutal violence, the UAE denies backing the group, seeking to portray itself as a regional trailblazer for progress and development. However, UN experts, human rights groups, and media outlets have documented its extensive support for the RSF, including the shipment of cheap Chinese-made drones and Chinese artillery. The UAE also uses shell companies to hire Colombian mercenaries to fight alongside the RSF.

While the EU resolution serves as another blow to the UAE’s reputation, it won’t stop the wealthy Gulf nation from supporting the RSF, say analysts and human rights advocates.

“Whenever the UAE gets called out, then they tend to double down,” said Kholood Khair, an analyst on Sudan and the founder of the Confluence Advisory think tank.
Symbolic Victory?

The resolution hasn’t changed the situation on the ground for civilians. In el-Obeid, some 500,000 civilians are living under a partial RSF siege, surrounded from the south and west.

SAF recently captured villages around el-Obeid and reopened a second vital supply line to the city.

As of now, civilians can only leave the city from the east and north, but the roads are dangerous. RSF drones threaten to hit any convoy that it believes carries material support for SAF.

The RSF launched at least 15 drones that killed 45 people over a span of three weeks in June, according to the UN Human Rights Office. The attacks have continued throughout July, hitting fuel tankers, water infrastructure, and electricity grids, and causing acute shortages of food and drinking water and widespread blackouts.

“Drones are still targeting civilians all over Sudan … what’s needed is [global] pressure to halt UAE supply lines to the RSF,” said Yahiya, a local relief worker in el-Obeid who requested a pseudonym due to the hostile security situation.

According to human rights groups and media reports, the UAE uses its financial leverage over regional partners — Chad, Libya, South Sudan, and Ethiopia — to funnel weapons and fighters to the RSF.

The EU’s latest sanctions banned all conflict gold smuggled out of Sudan. Both the RSF and the SAF financed their war efforts by selling billions of dollars’ worth of gold to the UAE, making the Emirates a key hub in Sudan’s war economy.

The UAE provides additional logistical, diplomatic, and financial support to the RSF.

Echoing Yahiya’s call, a recent report by Human Rights Watch urges the EU to take concrete steps against the UAE. Its recommendations include imposing targeted sanctions against UAE-linked companies that hire Colombian mercenaries, who are first covertly trained in the UAE and then deployed to Sudan.

Human Rights Watch also called on EU states to suspend all defense and military cooperation with the Emirates.

Yet Jonas Horner, an expert on Sudan with the European Council on Foreign Relations, said that EU members are unlikely to agree on punitive measures because some states fear jeopardizing their extensive economic ties with the UAE.

The two sides have roughly $328 billion in mutual investments. What’s more, EU foreign policy decisions require a consensus among all 27 EU member states. This makes it nearly impossible to pass punitive measures against a lucrative and strategic partner like the UAE.

“[The EU resolution] is as much a statement of the limitations of European diplomatic heft in the Gulf as it is a statement of Emirati confidence,” Horner told Truthout.
How Will the UAE React?

No evidence indicates the UAE has dialed back support to the RSF since the resolution was passed.

On July 22, local media reported that an attack believed to be carried out by the RSF killed 22 people in the town of Rahad, near el-Obeid. The group has also reportedly sent reinforcements toward the south of el-Obeid, fueling fears that it is preparing a major ground offensive that could lead to mass atrocities.

On the diplomatic level, Khair said that the Emirates may play up Iran’s relationship with SAF to win support from western capitals.

Tehran historically has links with members of Sudan’s Islamic Movement, some of whom hold powerful positions within SAF. During Sudan’s latest war, Iran restored diplomatic ties with SAF before sending weapon shipments of Mohajer-6 combat drones.

Given the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran, the Emirates could frame RSF as thwarting Iran’s regional influence. That would bestow the RSF with even more impunity to carry out atrocities.

“The regional conditions are perfect for the UAE to say that, ‘you know, what’s happening in Sudan may be bad, but it would be worse [for the West],’” Khair told Truthout.

Another possibility could see the UAE step up its lobbying efforts across European capitals. The last time the UAE went on a lobbying blitz was ahead of a European Parliament session on Sudan in November 2025.

The UAE reportedly insisted that it was playing a positive role in Sudan by claiming that it was working within established international frameworks to help mediate a ceasefire. It also claimed that its main priority was trying to help alleviate the humanitarian crisis by contributing some $784 million to the UN mission in Sudan.

The blitz worked, prompting EU ministers to omit its name from the ensuing resolution. Khair says that some ministers may have since grown fed up with Emirati officials lying in public — and private — about the UAE’s backing for the RSF.

Still, she stresses that the resolution should not be viewed as a major milestone.

“It’s really the bare minimum to call out the actors involved,” she said. “Really, the EU should be doing a lot more.”

This article is licensed under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0), and you are free to share and republish under the terms of the license.

Mat Nashed

Mat Nashed is an award-nominated journalist who has covered the MENA region since the Arab Spring. He was previously the feature’s print correspondent for Al Jazeera English and has written and reported for various other platforms, including Newlines Magazine, TIME, The New Humanitarian, the Committee to Protect Journalists, the Carnegie Endowment, and many others. He has extensively covered politics and conflict in the Nile Basin and the Levant.

Ukraine Hits At Iran: In The Caspian Sea, Things Get Even Messier – Analysis

Next-generation autonomous interceptors have successfully passed combat testing in the Kharkiv region. Credit: mod.gov.ua

July 29, 2026
 RFE RL
By Mike Eckel

Key Takeaways:

Ukrainian forces struck Russian and Iranian-linked cargo ships in the Caspian Sea that were allegedly transporting military cargo, marking a significant expansion of Kyiv’s long-range operations against the Iran-Russia military supply chain.

Iran reacted angrily, summoning Ukraine’s diplomat and vowing retaliation, but experts assess Tehran has limited ability to strike Ukraine directly and is more likely to respond indirectly or symbolically while prioritizing its own conflict with the US and Israel.

The attacks further intertwine the Ukraine and Iran wars, complicating efforts by the US to keep the two conflicts separate, while potentially increasing pressure on Iran-Russia logistics and aligning with broader Western interests in disrupting that partnership.

Iranian-designed drones have wreaked havoc for Ukrainian forces battling Russian troops as Moscow took Tehran’s technology and ran with it, supercharging production and deploying drones in devastating droves in its all-out war against Kyiv.

As far as Ukraine is concerned, that makes Iran an indirect combatant. And that means Iranian cargo ships heading to Russia are fair game as far as military targets go.


That’s what happened this weekend in the Caspian Sea, and Tehran is not happy.
Moscow’s 53-month-old invasion has scrambled politics for Europe. The US-Israeli war with Iran has scrambled politics for the Middle East.

So what do Ukrainian strikes on Iranian cargo — or Russian ships — in the Caspian mean for the two wars?

“If the Ukrainians continue doing this, it’s going to obviously make it more difficult for both Iran and Russia,” said Nicole Grajewski, an Russia-Iran expert with Sciences Po, the famed French university. But, she added, “I don’t see this as being a fundamental game changer in the war.”

“The Ukrainian strike against an Iranian ship represents a significant shift in tactics and sends a clear message that Ukraine will not tolerate aggression, regardless of where it originates,” said Luke Coffey, a Russia expert at the Hudson Institute, a Washington think tank.

“I suspect these types of operations will make shipping between Russia and Iran across the Caspian increasingly difficult,” he said.
Tehran ‘Leaves No Action Unanswered’

The circumstances of the July 25 incident are murky.

Ukraine’s main domestic intelligence agency, the SBU, said drones hit a Russian missile boat called the Molnyia, along with two cargo ships it said “were under international sanctions and were used to transport military cargo between Iran and Russia.”

Ukraine had “achieved very strong results with long range strikes in the Caspian Sea, including vessels used in military cargo shipments involving Iran,” Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, said in a post to Telegram.

That description points to two Russian-flagged cargo ships called the Port Olya 2 and the Begey, both of which are under international sanctions stemming from the Ukraine war.

It’s unknown exactly what the ships were transporting.

After receiving thousands of Iranian-built kamikaze drones in the initial months after the February 2022, Russia has set up its own assembly plants and added new enhancements to the original Iranian designs.

Iranian authorities reacted angrily to the ship attack, saying one sailor was killed and vowing retaliation. Ukraine’s top diplomat in Tehran was summoned to the Foreign Ministry in protest.

“Zelenskyy has attacked an Iranian commercial vessel, killing a sailor,” Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi said in a post on X, calling it “a blatant United Nations Charter violation done at Israel’s behest to drag Europe into its war.”


Kyiv will soon learn that Tehran “leaves no action unanswered,” Ebrahim Azizi, who heads the national security committee in Iran’s parliament, said in another post.

The Kremlin also weighed in, with spokesman Dmitry Peskov telling reporters that the Ukrainian attack should be seen as an attack on Iran itself.

Angry rhetoric aside, it’s unclear to what extent Iran would be able to retaliate.

“Tehran is clearly angry, but it has very limited ability to project military power against Ukraine,” said Saeid Golkar, an expert on Iran’s military who is a professor at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga.

“If it decides to respond, I’d expect something indirect such as cyber operations, intelligence activity, support for Russian operations, or possibly targeting Ukrainian interests abroad rather than a conventional military strike.”

“It’s not necessarily in Iran’s best interest to bring Ukraine into this conflict, and I don’t think it’s in Russia’s either,” Grajewski said. “The Russians may be putting pressure on Iran to kind of restrain themselves.”

Nate Swanson, who served as Iran director at the White House National Security Council under President Joe Biden, also doubted Iran’s ability to respond in a serious way.

“Iran’s bark is bigger than its bite when it comes to Ukraine,” said Swanson, now a researcher at the Atlantic Council, a Washington think tank.

“While it is possible that Iran undertakes some sort of symbolic response toward Ukraine, I doubt either Ukraine or Iran are looking to open more fronts in their respective wars.”

“Iran’s threats look more like signaling to Russia,” said Mikhail Troiskiy, who heads the Russia and Eurasia Program at the Fletcher School at Tufts University. “Tehran needs expanded support from Moscow, which likely isn’t granting all Iran’s requests for intelligence and equipment.”
It Cuts Both Ways’

The weekend’s attacks were not the first time Ukraine has hit targets in the Caspian.

Russia’s 28-ship Caspian Sea flotilla, which is based near Makhachkala, about 1,300 kilometers from territory still under Ukrainian control, has fired missiles at targets inside Ukraine in the past.

At least 12 Russian warships have previously been struck over the course of the Russian invasion, according to Coffey, though the extent of the damage in many cases was unclear.

Israel — which has conducted its own attacks on Iran in conjunction with US forces — has also hit Iranian targets on the Caspian.


On March 18, about three weeks after the start of the US-Israeli campaign, Israeli jets hit the port of Bandar Anzali, sinking an unknown number of naval ships.

Experts said it was possible Ukrainian forces acted this weekend with the help of Israeli intelligence.

“Strategically, it would make sense,” Golkar said. “Israel has excellent intelligence coverage on Iran, while Ukraine has a strong interest in disrupting Iran-Russia military cooperation.”

Zelenskyy, who was scheduled to meet President Donald Trump at the White House on July 28, was expected to try and portray the Ukrainian strikes as an important addition to the US campaign against Iran.

Zelenskyy was also expected to raise earlier Ukrainian claims that Russia has been supplying Iran with satellite images and other intelligence, helping Iran target US facilities in the Gulf region, including CIA stations.

The timing of the attacks was also likely intentional, Coffey said: to get the attention of the Trump administration.

“I don’t think it complicates matters for the Trump administration. If anything, additional pressure on Iran is likely to be viewed positively,” he said. “I also doubt it’s a coincidence that these strikes against Iranian shipping occurred just days before” Zelenskyy’s White House meetings.

But Kyiv’s efforts to intertwine the two wars may make things more difficult for Washington, Grajewski said.

The Americans “really don’t, for some reason, want to show that the Russians are involved in the [Iran] war,” she said. “So in that sense, yeah, it complicates things because the Ukrainians are coming out and saying that there’s direct Russian involvement.”


The Trump administration “wants to compartmentalize the two wars,” she said. “The more intertwined these two wars become, I think it’s going to be difficult to justify some of the policies coming toward Ukraine and connected to Iran.”

“This cuts both ways,” Golkar said.

“On one hand, disrupting Iran-Russia military cooperation aligns with broader US strategic interests without requiring direct American involvement. On the other hand, it adds another layer of complexity. Washington now has to manage relations with Ukraine, Israel, Gulf partners, and Iran while trying to prevent a wider regional escalation.”

Mike Eckel is a senior international correspondent reporting on political and economic developments in Russia, Ukraine, and around the former Soviet Union, as well as news involving cybercrime and espionage. He’s reported on the ground on Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the wars in Chechnya and Georgia, and the 2004 Beslan hostage crisis, as well as the annexation of Crimea in 2014.

About RFE RL

RFE/RL journalists report the news in 21 countries where a free press is banned by the government or not fully established.

 

Moscow To Deploy Dirigibles To Better Defend Russia Against Ukrainian Drones – OpEd

 July 29, 2026

By Paul Goble

One of the reasons drones are so effective is that they fly so low that until they are very close to their targets, they are protected against detection by the curvature of the earth. Ever more countries, the US, Israel and China, have developed dirigibles to raise the  height of radar detectors and allow for the earlier detection of drones and their destruction.

In the face of Ukrainian drone attacks ever deeper into the Russian Federation, Moscow has decided to join them and has now announced the development of airships with a carrying capacity of 30 to 50 tons, allowing them to serve in a military capacity against drones (versia.ru/rossiya-sozdayot-pvo-na-osnove-dirizhablej).

How soon Russia will be able to produce such platforms in large numbers has not been announced and is not yet clear; but developments in this area could be a game changer that would blunt the current advantages those using drones to attack currently enjoy.

Of course, Russian experts concede that dirigibles are not a complete solution. Slow moving, they are easy targets; of limited carrying capacity, they cannot lift large radar arrays and other equipment; and of light weight, they can be thrown off course or even destroyed by high winds.

According to the Versiya news portal, all this means is that dirigibles will fill an important niche but only a niche: “AWACS will retain the role of mobile command posts and  satellites will continue to provide  widespread surveillance” while dirigibles “will serve as inexpensive extended duty platforms.”

In other defense news, the Russian defense ministry has announced that it is postponing even the discussion about the construction of new aircraft carriers until the 2040s, thus pushing back an earlier deadline of 203 for the delivery of such ships (agents.media/rossiya-peredumala-stroit-avianostsy-do-2040-h-godov/).

 

Senate passes Graham's “hellish sanctions” package during Zelenskiy's trip to Washington in coup for Bankova

Zelenskiy was in Washington to attend the funeral of the late Senator Graham, as the Senate signed off on his "hellish sanctions" bill in a diplomatic coup for Bankova. / White HouseFacebookTwitter

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By Ben Aris in Berlin July 29, 2026

The US Senate passed the “sanctions from hell” package advanced by the late Senator Lindsey Graham on July 29 with an overwhelming majority of 86 to 12 in favour, with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy in attendance.

Zelenskiy was in Washington to visit US President Donald Trump to consolidate on rapidly improving relations between the US and Ukraine after the low water mark of their “you’ve got no cards” clash with Trump in the Oval office in February. Reportedly, Trump has been impressed by Ukraine’s progress on the battlefield this year, and prowess with drone war tactics and technology, after being humbled by the same weapons in his own war in Iran.

The Ukrainian president was in the capital along with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for the occasion of Graham’s funeral, who died unexpectedly last week. Graham was one of Ukraine’s biggest advocates in the US government and proposed crushing sanctions that would have imposed 500% tariffs on any country that trades with Russia – especially the sanctions are designed to punish China and India in particular which remain big buyers of Russian oil.

The final package was watered down, reducing the tariff rate to 100% and giving Trump unprecedented powers to impose and remove the tariff regime.

Trump said he would support the bill, but asked that sanctions on Iran be added, as the Iran war enters its sixth month with little progress made.

Zelenskiy said the new ​sanctions legislation would hit Russia's ability to ⁠finance the war and send a “powerful signal” about renewed US support for the Ukrainian people.

"It's also a big signal to Europe, big signal to Ukraine, big support of our people, so I'm very thankful," Zelenskiy told reporters before heading into the Senate chamber before the vote ​on what has been renamed the "Lindsey O. Graham Sanctioning Russia and Iran Act of 2026."

“Today in Washington, we had a major meeting with representatives of both parties in the Senate – more than 60 senators were present. Thank you for this support and for your high assessment of the results of our warriors on the front lines and Ukraine’s ability to respond justly to Russia for its strikes against our people,” Zelenskiy said in a post on social media. “We discussed many issues, first and foremost, anti-ballistic defence. Thank you for your readiness to help.”

After the vote a bipartisan statement said the passage of the bill would stop foreign ⁠purchases of Russian oil and gas revenue from fuelling Russian President Vladimir Putin's "war machine" as well as restrict "the Iranian regime’s ability to support terrorism and build its nuclear program," Reuters reports.

What’s in the bill

The increase in tariffs, which have been transformed into a political weapon by the Trump administration, has concerned economists as they push up inflation at home, say Democratic lawmakers, who are also unhappy about the expanded powers the bill hands the president.

“Congress must stop outsourcing responsibility for ‌trade and ⁠tariffs to a runaway executive who is more interested in consolidating his own power than in the welfare of the American people,” Democrats said in a statement, cited by Reuters.

There is no mechanism for congressional ​disapproval of any tariffs, and the ​authority for the president never ⁠expires, according to Democrats, who pointed out that the bill gives Trump complete authority to use the bill as a weapon to threaten allies like Europe and Japan as well, beyond the control or oversight of Congress.

The bill also in effect makes it possible to sanction any ship, company or insurer assisting Russian oil exports, without the need for separate legislation or evaluation process, with no right of appeal. That would allow the US to seize ships under the authority of the new bill without warning of an official announcement of being added to the Specially Designated Nationals and Blocked Persons (SDN) Lists.

While the bill doesn’t name any countries, the top five buyers of Russian crude are China, India, Slovakia, Hungary and Azerbaijan, and the top importers of Russian natural gas are China, ​France, Japan, Hungary and Belgium. Another point of contention is in theory the US would have to impose 100% tariffs on Europe which remains addicted to Russian gas imports as it races to refill its underground storage tanks ahead of the heating season or face a new gas crisis.

However, a calve out has been built into the bill for US allies, with exceptions for countries that import less than 15% of Russia's natural gas and take “significant steps” to reduce those imports. Aides said that would provide an exemption for Japan, France, Hungary and Belgium, Reuters reports. The EU is planning to ban imports of Russian gas completely by January 1, although analysts question the feasibility of the plan due to the end of Persian LNG exports due to the war in the Gulf.

As IntelliNews has reported, the sanctions regime on Russia has largely failed to produce its desired result: bring Russia’s economy to its knees and force Putin to cut a deal. The boomerang effect means that they have inflicted more pain on Europe than on Russia which is now rapidly deindustrialising and the effort has been undermined by lobbying by EU member states to protect their own commercial interests. A Greek veto forced the European Commission (EC) to water down the latest 21st sanctions package to exclude Greek tankers from the restrictions, which make up a fifth of Russia’s shadow fleet. Other EU lobbies also blocked the inclusion of fish, sable pelts and a full ban on the imports of aluminium and diamonds.

The sanctions have hurt the US economy less as it has little trade with Russia but it is still totally dependent on Russian highly enriched uranium as fuel for its nuclear power stations and has also introduced a calve out that runs until 2028. The new Graman bill is designed to close loopholes that have meant until now oil sanctions have been largely ineffective; Russia earned $160bn from oil exports last year – enough to almost cover its entire military spending bill in that year.

Despite the misgivings with the bill, Democrats largely joined the vote to approve the bill in an unusual bipartisan decision. About half a dozen fence-sitters were persuaded to vote “Yea” after meeting personally with Zelenskiy in the Capitol before the vote.

 The 12 senators who voted against advancing the bill were: Rand Paul: Bernie Sanders: Elizabeth Warren: Lisa Blunt Rochester: Maggie Hassan: Mazie Hirono: Andy Kim: Ed Markey: Jon Ossoff: Alex Padilla: Peter Welch: and Ron Wyden​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​.

“All of these Senators should be shamed. Why would they want Russia to get off easy when Russia is assisting Iran with killing US soldiers and they are slaughtering innocent civilians with ballistic missiles in Ukraine?” Laura Looner, a Trump advisor, said in a post on social media, who has just returned from a high profile trip to Kyiv.

Relations in flux

Netanyahu was also in town to try and persuade that the Iran nuclear threat remains real.

According to aides he declined to meet Zelenskiy during the Washington visit, Haaretz sources say. Israeli support for Ukraine in its fight against Russia has been lukewarm, as Tel Aviv maintains cordial relations with the Kremlin, partly thanks to its large Russian minority, and has sat on the fence during most of the last four and half years.

A Ukrainian source said Netanyahu's office initially proposed the meeting but later said the prime minister's schedule was too tight; Trump supporters fear Israel and Ukraine are exacerbating the US role in global conflicts against Iran and Russia, Haaretz reports.

The Washington trip was a diplomatic coup for Bankova, Ukraine’s presidential administration, undoing much of the damage done at the start of this year. Trump has been brought round by Ukraine’s “turning point” progress narrative on the battlefield that was relentlessly pushed by Bankova and the mainstream media ahead of the Ankara Nato summit on July 8.

"Now, the initiative is not in the hands of Putin," Zelensky said in an interview with Fox News following his White House meeting on July 28.

However, as IntelliNews reported, the situation on in Donbas is going less well as the Armed Forces of Russia (AFR) have nearly recaptured the key Donbas “fortress city” of Kostiantynivka and are now advancing on the other two cities of Kramatorsk and Sloviansk.

The White House has now effectively withdrawn from the efforts to broker a ceasefire deal and has signed up to Bankova and Brussel’s strategy of “increasing the pressure” and forcing Russian President Vladimir Putin to the negotiating table after much progress was made last year culminating in the Moscow meeting on December 3 with Putin where the framework of a 27-point peace plan (27PPP) was agreed.

“The whole program here is to bring Putin to the negotiating table,” Senator Mike Rounds said following a meeting with the Ukrainian president as cited by Politico. “Zelenskiy believed that Putin would think a little bit more about trying to negotiate a settlement if the sanctions were in place and actually creating more irritation and, as he put it, I believe, ‘anger’ with the war with the Russian people.”

Putin warned his generals on July 28 to prepare for a three-year war and Zelenskiy has also been preparing for at least two more years of war after securing a €90bn EU loan to pay for it. During the Nato summit, Zelenskiy said the war has “gone into the air” as a brutal tit-for-tat missile war is rapidly escalating that is targeting civilian assets such as supermarkets, petrol stations and port infrastructure. Ukraine has largely destroyed the Wildberries’ warehouses through which just under 9% of Russia’s entire retail sales pass, while Russia has stepped up its bombing of the Odesa port which handles 90% of Ukraine’s seaborne exports in just the last week.

Still, the Trump administration support for Ukraine remains largely symbolic. While the new Graham sanctions will cause Russia more headaches, it will continue to sell its oil and China at least will do its best to ignore them on principle. However, down to the dregs of interceptor missiles, Ukraine’s skies are increasingly open to Russia’s large stockpile of ballistic missiles that can only be brought down by US PAC-3 interceptor missiles and there was no word from Trump that he would make more air defence ammo available to Ukraine. During the Nato summit Trump surprised by granting Ukraine a license to make Patriot missiles, but those factors won’t come online for at least a year – if then.

Zelenskiy said that he had a “good talk” with Trump on the topic of Patriot missiles, but as anticipated, nothing concrete was announced, other than to “intensify the negotiation process at all levels,” according to a Zelenskiy aide, cited by Politico.

“Of course, I shared what we need, our needs. I shared it with the president today. I was thankful to him for this meeting, and now I shared with senators,” Zelenskiy told reporters. “So, we will try to manage it. It’s a big, big challenge.”

Zelenskiy also reportedly met with representatives from Lockheed Martin Corp., which produces missiles for the Patriot defences, adding in a post on social media that his team was, “already working on specific solutions to move to co-production as quickly as possible.” Last week, Zelenskiy also met with a team from Raytheon, which is a contractor for the overall Patriot system.

In the meantime, Bankova is anticipating a repeat of Putin’s attempt to freeze Ukraine into submission by bombing what remains of Ukraine’s power generation capacity. Prewar Ukraine had just under 60GW of generating capacity; now it has 14GW left, according to IntelliNews calculations.

'Seriously?' Ex-Russia ambassador laughs off Trump's plan for Putin

Tom Boggioni
July 28, 2026 

RAW STORY


Ex-Ambassador Michel McFaul (MS NOW screenshot)

President Donald Trump’s proposal to ask Vladimir Putin to come clean on Russian involvement in Iran drew a smirk and an incredulous reaction from the former US Ambassador to Russia.

Appearing on MS NOW with host Stephanie Ruhle to discuss Trump’s meeting with Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Tuesday, the “Money Power Politics” host Michael McFaul asked why Trump continues to turn to Putin for news and advice.

Referring to reports that Russia may be giving backdoor help to Iran after Trump attacked the Middle Eastern country, McFaul remarked, “Well, first, Russia and Iran are allies; they coordinate, they sell weapons together. There's — I can't imagine that there's not intelligence sharing. I don't have privy to secret information anymore. That's first.”

“Number two: What is he saying?” he asked rhetorically. “ We'll find out. How come he doesn't know? You know, maybe we should be increasing our intelligence community and strengthening it, rather than gutting it in some kind of purge that's going on now.”

“And then third, ‘I'm going to ask Putin’ — seriously?” he exclaimed. “Putin's never going to tell him the truth on that. And the very notion that he sets it up, that that's how he's going to find out whether it's truth or not, it's just shocking to me that he continues to say things like that.”

“And I think it's embarrassing for him,” he pointed out. “I think it's such a weak look that he says things like that. I don't understand why his team doesn't explain to him: Mr. President, you look weak when you make statements like that.”

Putin Suffers Humiliating Blow as Russia’s Crisis Spirals

Leigh Kimmins
Tue, July 28, 2026
DAILY BEAST


Alexander Zemlianichenko / via REUTERS


Foreign tourists are balking at visiting Russia, as Vladimir Putin's domestic crisis deepens.

The Kremlin demagogue is facing unprecedented pressure as the war in Ukraine hits home and Donald Trump's war on Iran disrupts energy markets and the global aviation sector.

As the picture gets increasingly bleak, tourists and visitors are taking notice—and staying away, according to figures from Rosstat, the national statistics agency.

Between January and June this year, foreigners made 2.99 million tourist trips to Russia, a year-on-year decline of 19.6 percent, Rosstat reported, despite being a tightly controlled instrument of the Kremlin's political and economic agenda.

Smoke billows from a warehouse after deadly Ukrainian drone attacks in Russia. / Social Media / Social Media via REUTERS

Chinese tourists make up by far the largest share of foreign visitors to Russia, accounting for just over half of arrivals last year under Russian border data. Saudi Arabia is a distant second, followed by Turkmenistan, Turkey, Germany, and the United Arab Emirates. A separate Rosstat methodology, which also counts visits from neighboring countries, similarly ranks China among the top sources of inbound travelers, alongside Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan.

Marina Levchenko is general director of "Tari Tour," a company based in the capital that offers trips to Moscow and Putin's hometown, St. Petersburg. She told Russian business daily Kommersant that Trump's war is to blame for affecting flight programs, as well as negative news about Russia.

Tourists remain wary of reports of a fuel crisis and airport disruptions, Levchenko said, adding that high travel costs are also discouraging visitors. The Association of Tour Operators of Russia likewise identified flight disruptions as the main factor suppressing inbound tourism.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky began intensifying drone attacks on Russian oil refineries in mid-June, creating a fuel crisis the likes of which have not been seen since Putin's rise to power more than 25 years ago, NBC News reported. Crucially for Putin and his favorability rating, the crisis is affecting ordinary Russians.

Gas stations in many regions have taken the unprecedented move of introducing rationing schemes and restrictions, and social media has been flooded with videos of long lines and frustrated drivers.

That has generated negative headlines that, coupled with imagery of drones whizzing over Russia's biggest cities, may have prompted potential visitors to think again.

The war in Iran had already forced Russia to introduce a ban on gasoline exports, and now, the Kremlin has begun importing petroleum products, according to NBC.

Those worries come as Putin is already facing anger from small business owners after Ukrainian drones destroyed more than $2 billion worth of inventory at warehouses owned by Wildberries, an online retailer that is Russia's response to Amazon.

Zelensky has intensified attacks on Russia. / Laura Loomer/X

The Russian president has tried to downplay the crisis by saying the shortages are not as critical as local authorities have suggested, and has blamed panic buying for much of the chaos.

The stress is clearly getting to Putin. He scrapped Russia's Navy Day parade over fears of Ukrainian strikes and then raged to a group of sailors about a revenge fantasy and Soviet dictator Josef Stalin.

After canceling the parade—which was set to feature around 200 warships sailing along the Neva River in St. Petersburg—the president opted for a televised meeting with Navy personnel. In an apparent bid to save face, he angrily predicted that Ukraine would ultimately fall apart, claiming that Russia had actually been the only "guarantor" of Ukraine's "territorial integrity." Apart from the eastern regions of Ukraine that Moscow has tried to claim as its own, Putin declared the western regions "a gift from Stalin" and claimed they would "sooner or later" return to Hungary, Romania, and Poland.

Ukrainian Drone Attacks Lead Moscow To Revive Idea Of Buffer Zone In Border Areas – Analysis

Map of Ukraine. Credit: DOD


July 29, 2026
By Paul Goble

Key Takeaways:

Ukrainian drone strikes into the Russian Federation have prompted the Kremlin to revive the idea of creating a buffer zone in western Russian regions and in Russian-occupied regions of Ukraine to prevent or at least limit such strikes.

The Russian government has not released details on what such a zone would entail, and there is much disagreement in Moscow over its potential size, the number of additional troops required, and whether its creation would involve the forced removal of people living there.

Creating such a zone has Russian President Vladimir Putin’s public backing, though the increasing range of Ukrainian drones has led some Russians to express doubts, with some calling the idea “stupid” unless the Ukrainian state were destroyed and its entire territory absorbed into the zone.

In response to Ukrainian drone strikes targeting infrastructure ever deeper into the Russian Federation, Russian Press Secretary Dmitry Peskov revived the idea of creating a buffer zone in Russian regions lying along the Ukrainian border and in Russian-occupied regions of Ukraine on the other side (Interfax, July 9). This idea was first enshrined in the Minsk Accords after Moscow seized Ukraine’s Crimea and parts of other Ukrainian regions, and it resurfaced after Ukraine seized Russia’s Kursk oblast (RBC, May 12, 2025).

In the past month, it has returned to Russian discussions with new force following Ukrainian drone strikes on Russian infrastructure deep within the country and a Kyiv proposal for limiting such long-range strikes in both directions, a proposal Russian President Vladimir Putin has rejected out of hand (RIA Novosti, June 28). To date, the Russian government has not released details on what such a zone might look like, how large it would be, how many additional troops would be needed to create it, and whether its creation would require the expulsion of people living there (Nakanune.ru, July 15).

While the idea of such a buffer zone enjoys Putin’s support, a growing number of Russian politicians and commentators are skeptical, with some describing the idea as useless or even “stupid” (RIA Novosti, June 28). Their skepticism centers on three factors—the increasing range of Ukrainian drone strikes, the massive troop numbers the policy would require, including a likely general mobilization, and how forced expulsions, reminiscent of Stalin-era policies, would play with the Russian population (Nakanune.ru, July 15, 22; Vot Tak, July 22; Novaya Gazeta, July 23).


The fighting between Russian and Ukrainian forces has created a broad zone of displacement that extends well beyond the front line itself, and Kyiv and Moscow have responded to it in starkly different ways. Most reporting on the war speaks only of a front line, though the fighting affects people at considerable distances from where troops are positioned. Since Putin seized Ukraine’s Crimea and parts of several other Ukrainian regions in 2014, and especially since the Kremlin leader launched his expanded invasion of Ukraine in 2022, people living in places near the fighting have fled, and the two governments have taken a variety of steps to help them. These efforts have expanded alongside a rising civilian death toll, which reached a record last month. That trend has created enormous challenges for both governments, according to Nikolay Mitrokhin, a Russian sociologist now at the University of Bremen (Vot Tak, July 22).

Tens of thousands of people are involved, though exact numbers remain unavailable given the confusion surrounding these movements. Kyiv has consistently adopted a proactive approach, according to Mitrokhin, warning populations well in advance of Russian attacks and helping them relocate voluntarily. Moscow, in contrast, has been less consistent, neither warning local populations nor providing the assistance it has promised. The Russian government has instead responded to the problem almost exclusively during crises, such as the Ukrainian seizure of Kursk in 2024 and the current wave of Ukrainian drones striking targets deep within the Russian Federation (Vot Tak, July 22).


Moscow’s renewed interest in a buffer zone appears driven more by Ukrainian drone attacks on the Russian interior than by any shift at the front, suggesting the idea functions as a public relations effort to calm the population rather than a plan the Kremlin intends to carry out. Putin and his spokesman admitted as much when they suggested that the deeper Ukrainian drones strike targets in Russia, the larger such a buffer zone would need to be (Interfax, July 9).

Russian commentators have been reluctant to specify how deep such a zone would need to be, though the few who have offered figures suggest roughly 300 kilometers (186 miles) would be required (Nakanune.ru, July 15). Ukraine already strikes targets more than 2,000 kilometers (1,240 miles) inside Russia with drones and has announced plans to develop drones with a range of 10,000 kilometers (6,200 miles). Any buffer zone large enough to stop such strikes would have to encompass all Ukrainian territory, rendering the concept meaningless unless it did exactly that (Vot Tak, July 22).

The lack of specificity surrounding the buffer zone, including its size, the number of troops required, and whether current residents could remain, has pushed the debate from closed Kremlin discussions into the public sphere, where the Kremlin is losing control of the narrative.

The most dramatic example of this shift, one that may kill off the buffer-zone idea altogether, came in a recent broadcast by outspoken Russian television host Vladimir Solovyev, who argued that Moscow must be ready to move 200,000 to 300,000 people from Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia, Kursk, and Bryansk oblasts away from “the line of the front” and resettle them in the Middle Volga, the Urals, and the Russian Far East (RIA Pivden, July 23).


Several Russian military analysts called the idea reasonable for wartime planning, arguing that governments must prepare for worst-case scenarios precisely to avoid them, and suggested that Moscow might relocate people to regions near the North Caucasus rather than east of the Urals, as some feared (Nakanune.ru, July 22).

The prospect of mass deportations reminiscent of Stalin-era policies has provoked public outrage in Russia, undermining political support for the buffer-zone concept. Many Russians reacted with alarm at the prospect that Moscow might again deport large numbers of people, and whole nationalities, into the interior of the country (Novaya Gazeta, July 23). Some Russians may not draw this parallel or might even welcome it. Prominent commentators and even senior Duma figures now argue that a depopulated buffer zone along the Russian–Ukrainian border will not stop the drone attacks in the way the Kremlin suggests, calling the latest Putin proposal simply “stupid” (Vot Tak; Nakanune.ru, July 22).

The most likely outcome is that Moscow will not build a buffer zone anytime soon, and the idea will fade from the Russian media. The discussion itself, however, will carry lasting political consequences. Putin’s talk of a buffer zone appears to be backfiring, with more people questioning his judgment, even if not yet prepared to act against him. This corrosion of authority matters, since it suggests a growing number of Russian elites may conclude that challenging Putin is no longer the fool’s errand many have long assumed. 

This article was published by The Jamestown Foundation

About Paul Goble
Paul Goble is a longtime specialist on ethnic and religious questions in Eurasia. Most recently, he was director of research and publications at the Azerbaijan Diplomatic Academy. Earlier, he served as vice dean for the social sciences and humanities at Audentes University in Tallinn and a senior research associate at the EuroCollege of the University of Tartu in Estonia. He has served in various capacities in the U.S. State Department, the Central Intelligence Agency and the International Broadcasting Bureau as well as at the Voice of America and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Mr. Goble maintains the Window on Eurasia blog and can be contacted directly at paul.goble@gmail.com .
View all posts by Paul Goble

Record seaweed blankets Mexico's Caribbean coast, threatening tourism and the environment

By Iñigo Alexander and Paola Chiomante
Tue, July 28, 2026
REUTERS

Members of the Mexican Navy collect sargassum seaweed from a beach in the hotel zone in Tulum, Mexico, July 22, 2026. REUTERS/Paola Chiomante

An eagle perches on sargassum seaweed covering the shoreline of a beach in the hotel zone in Tulum, Mexico July 22, 2026. REUTERS/Paola Chiomante

A drone view shows tourists on the shoreline as sargassum seaweed discolours the waters along Mexico's Caribbean coast, where growing accumulations linked to climate change are driving visitors away and threatening businesses that depend on tourism, in Puerto Morelos, Mexico, July 24, 2026. REUTERS/Paola Chiomante

Sargassum seaweed covering the shoreline of a deserted beach in the hotel zone in Tulum, Mexico July 22, 2026. REUTERS/Paola Chiomante


A drone view shows sargassum seaweed covering the shoreline of a deserted beach in the hotel zone in Tulum, Mexico, July 22, 2026. REUTERS/Paola Chiomante


TULUM, Mexico, July 28 (Reuters) - A record wave of brown, smelly seaweed is washing up on beaches along Mexico's Caribbean coast, forcing closures in top tourist destinations and inflicting mounting economic damage on hotels, restaurants ‌and shops.

The unprecedented mass of sargassum – a brown seaweed that drifts across the Atlantic in vast mats and is pushed ‌by ocean currents toward Caribbean shorelines in the springtime – has prompted the federal government to prepare an emergency plan to combat the issue.

In the eastern state of Quintana ​Roo, a tourist hot spot home to once-crystalline beaches including Cancun and Playa del Carmen, environmental officials project 119,000 tons of sargassum to wash up on the shore by year's end, surpassing last year's record of 96,000 tons.

"Warmer temperatures are going to give you more sargassum," said Brian Barnes, a research assistant professor at the College of Marine Science at the University of South Florida who studies the phenomenon, adding that a combination ‌of nutrients and long days of sunlight also plays ⁠a role.

Once stranded on beaches, sargassum quickly begins to rot, releasing a stench often compared to rotten eggs.

"The drop in tourism is extremely serious," Tulum Councilman Eugenio Barbachano said, laying the blame on the sargassum epidemic. "The ⁠low season is not just low, it is critical."

Workers line many beaches along Quintana Roo's Riviera Maya, knee-deep in seaweed as they shovel heaps of sargassum off the shoreline to polish the coast - an arguably Sisyphean task as some of the season's worst months may still be to come.

Quintana Roo ​Governor ​Mara Lezama has said managing sargassum costs the state roughly 11% of its ​GDP, or about $2 billion annually, while the Riviera Maya ‌hotel association estimates the cost of combating the seaweed at roughly $150 million annually.

Still, in recent weeks, dozens of Quintana Roo beaches have been placed on red alert for the algae, some even closing. In late June, 92.5% of the state's beaches registered an "excessive" level of sargassum, according to a local monitoring network.

"Quintana Roo is a state that sells beaches, blue sea and water activities," said Carlos Solis, a local tourism service provider. "It affects everything."

Marine scientists also warn that the decomposing seaweed starves underwater plant life of sunlight, reducing biodiversity, and can even leak arsenic ‌and other heavy metals into the sand.

Workers who shoveled sargassum off beaches in ​the past report itchy and burning skin, headaches, fatigue and nausea linked to ​the algae, according to a 2025 study published in a scientific ​journal.

In an effort to combat the seaweed, the Mexican Navy has deployed a sargassum-fighting fleet, including 11 specialized ‌coastal ships, an amphibious sargassum collector, 18 support boats, ​two barges and four drones. It ​has also installed more than 9,000 meters (29,500 feet) of containment barriers to protect beaches.

The government is due to present a revised response plan on July 30 in hopes of better tackling the issue .

Brian Lapointe, research professor at Florida Atlantic University's Harbor Branch ​Oceanographic Institute, said the Caribbean needs a system ‌that connects "satellite observations and modeling forecasts with targeted intervention before sargassum reaches the beach."

Some tourists are braving the seaweed-blanketed waters.

"I ​went swimming today," said Wendy, a Swedish tourist. "I expected worse."

(Reporting by Iñigo Alexander and Paola Chiomante; Additional reporting by ​Anna Portella and Hugo Monnet; Editing by Emily Green and Lincoln Feast.)

Their land was taken centuries ago. Now the Pamunkey tribe is getting it back.

Dana Hedgpeth,

 (c) 2026 , The Washington Post

Tue, July 28, 2026 


Their land was taken centuries ago. Now the Pamunkey tribe is getting it back.

The 13 acres overlooking the river that bears their name have long been a part of the Pamunkey Indian Tribe's ancestral homeland.

The land in King William County, Virginia, was taken from them centuries ago, but through a recent $1.9 million deal, the tribe regained ownership and plans to expand its cultural and economic presence in the region.

The return of the land marks a milestone for the Pamunkey tribe, which gained federal recognition in 2015 and has roughly 530 enrolled members. The purchase also reflects a broader movement by Native nations across the country to reclaim territorial lands lost through broken treaties, forced dispossession and private acquisition.

Known as Windsor Shades estate, the property - about two hours south of Washington - has a long history. It was for centuries one of several villages where Pamunkey chiefs lived, and it was called Kupkipcock in the Powhatan Algonquin language. English explorer John Smith documented it in an early 1600s map of Native American villages. The property later became a Revolutionary War landmark. It remained in private ownership for decades.

"This is land that was taken from us in the 17th century, and getting it back now is righting a historical wrong," said Ashley Atkins Spivey, a citizen of the Pamunkey tribe and an anthropologist. "This land was ours for thousands and thousands of years, and the non-Indigenous occupation of it is a blip in time, compared to the relationship and connection our people have to it."

Officials with the Pamunkey tribe said they're considering plans to use the land to provide cultural, educational and economic opportunities, possibly using it as an event space or partnering with an operator to host wine tastings.

When the deal closed in May, Pamunkey Chief Kevin Brown said that the purchase was "more than a real estate transaction; it is an act of historical recognition and cultural preservation."

Two other Virginia tribes have also recently regained pieces of their homelands. The Rappahannock tribe closed a deal for 700 acres, part of a decade-long effort to reclaim more than 2,000 acres in an area known as Fones Cliffs in Richmond County. Earlier this month, Virginia Gov. Abigail Spanberger signed an agreement placing 28 acres of land in King William County that were once part of the Mattaponi Indian Tribe's original land into a state trust for the tribe.

At Windsor Shades, archaeological evidence shows that the Pamunkeys occupied the site long before English settlers arrived. Pamunkey tribal chiefs, including Opechancanough - the younger brother of Powhatan, one of the most famous and powerful Native chiefs on the East Coast - lived there with their families. Nearby, other Pamunkey communities helped produce food and paid tribute to the chiefs and their families.

Smith referred to the village as "a king house" in his writings and on his map, historians said.

"It's profoundly meaningful that this property is returning to the Pamunkey tribe," said Jennie Dotts, the Long & Foster real estate agent who represented the tribe. "It was their land originally, and now it is theirs once again. That's a satisfying sense of history coming full circle."

Around 1640, the property Windsor Shades became part of a roughly 5,000-acre land grant awarded to English settler William Claiborne by the Virginia colony after his forces defeated the Pamunkeys in battle, according to historians and the real estate company involved in the sale.

Built in the mid-1700s, the house on the property is one of Virginia's best-preserved examples of an 18th-century Tidewater structure. The property became well-known in the 1750s after a ferry was established there and a tavern opened in the English basement of the house, with an outside stairway entrance. Historians believe that George Washington stopped regularly at the tavern while traveling between Mount Vernon and Williamsburg, based on a dozen entries in his diaries.

In 1781, the Marquis de Lafayette and his troops crossed the Pamunkey River at Ruffin's Ferry on the property before heading to the Battle of Yorktown.

Windsor Shades, about 15 minutes from the tribe's reservation, later became a tobacco plantation and was eventually placed under a historic easement. The five-bedroom brick house features several chimneys. The spot where the tavern was is now a dining room and contains what Dotts said is one of Virginia's largest interior fireplaces, with an eight-foot opening. Dotts said she specializes in historic properties and "rarely comes across one so historically intact and meticulously preserved."

Windsor Shades is listed on the National Register of Historic Places and is named as a Virginia historic landmark.

The sale came about after one of Atkins Spivey's research associates, who serves on a local historical board and is married to a Pamunkey tribal member, learned that Carl and Lynn Fischer, who had owned Windsor Shades since the late 1990s, planned to put it on the market. Brown, the tribal chief, became involved in the spring.

Tribal leaders said it is unfortunate that so much time passed before they were able to reacquire Windsor Shades, but they are relieved to have it back in Native hands.

"It took so long because we were dealing with massive amounts of European colonial expansion, and we didn't have the capacity to fight that army of invaders," Atkins Spivey said. "While we've been able to survive, we didn't have the funds or resources to buy a piece of land back until recently. Now we have the economic capacity to do that."