Morning opening: This terrible war

Jakub Krupa

US secretary of state Marco Rubio said that the war in Ukraine “needs to come to an end,” after his conversation with his Russian counterpart, Sergei Lavrov.

Responding to the strikes on Kyiv over the weekend and repeated warnings about more attacks planned in the coming days, Rubio said:

“Look, every time you see these big strikes from one side or the other, it’s a reminder of why this is a terrible war that’s now gone on longer than the second world war, and it needs to come to an end.”

Rubio said that Lavrov wanted to reiterate his warning to the US to pull its diplomats from the Ukrainian capital, but appeared to downplay it, saying:

“They sent a notice to all the embassies, and I think he was just calling me personally to tell me – they told all the embassies to – Kyiv’s going to be a very dangerous place – Kyiv’s been a very dangerous place now for a number of years.”

Despite the warning, several European diplomats insisted they would stay put in the capital, including the EU’s ambassador Katarina Mathernova.

But Rubio cautioned against the threat of further escalation:

“Look, the danger in all of these wars as they continue and then they go on is that they always have the threat of escalation, of spreading into something new.”

Curiously, Rubio said that Lavrov also wanted to “relay” a message from Russia’s Vladimir Putin to US president Donald Trump, without offering more details.

Elsewhere, I will look at the European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen’s visit to Lithuania as she wants to offer her solidarity with the region amid growing Russian threats, follow closely Hungary’s Péter Magyar as he delivers a speech on planned reforms in the Hungarian parliament, and bring you the latest on the record-heating heatwave across Europe.

It’s Tuesday, 26 May 2026, it’s Jakub Krupa here, and this is Europe Live.

Good morning.