President Donald Trump says he will speak with Vladimir Putin "very soon" as the U.S. tracks reports of a suspected pneumonic plague death in Russia's Siberia region.

A cargo ship sank in the Black Sea off NATO member Bulgaria after a combined aerial and maritime drone attack. Volodymyr Zelenskyy blamed Russia as search and rescue efforts continue.

US'watching closely' after plague researcher dies in Russia, Rubio says To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. The US says it is closely monitoring the case of a Russian lab technician who died at a plague research centre in Siberia. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said there was concern the incident could have led to the spread of pneumonic plague, but that there was no cause for alarm. Announcing the cause of death as pneumonia of undetermined etiology, Irkutsk's governor said that no micro-organisms linked to the woman's work had been found in her biological samples. Unconfirmed reports had suggested the woman fell ill either after breaking a test tube containing the pathogen or following a field trip to a region where plague is found naturally among wild rodents. No other cases of staff from the plague institute seeking medical attention since her death had been reported, Irkutsk governor Igor Kobzev said, quoting Russia's consumer and health watchdog, Rospotrebnadzor.

Zelensky condemns'horrific' Russian strike on boat carrying corn in Black Sea Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky has condemned a horrific Russian attack on a vessel carrying corn in the Black Sea. The ship's captain was killed in the strike involving two drones, Zelensky said, and another sailor was unaccounted for. Eleven crew members - nationals of Azerbaijan and India - have been rescued. Romania said it had mounted a rescue mission after a fire on the ship Royad Mammadov outside the country's territorial waters. It said two people had died.

Is the war entering a new phase? On the day of her 41st wedding anniversary, Vera Gulyaeva recalled her husband's life and death. In March, a Russian drone plunged into a bread line in the southern Ukrainian town of Oleshky, killing several people and wounding Serhiy Gulyaev, a retired 63-year-old driver. The Gulyaevs, who had met at a friends' wedding in 1985, lived in a small house they had built. They were reluctant to leave even after their children fled to Kyiv-controlled areas.

Vladimir Putin has said Russia will use all weapons at his disposal if it considers it has come under direct attack in its Baltic exclave of Kaliningrad. Addressing the Valdai foreign policy forum, Putin insisted Russia was not threatening anyone and merely responding to statements by Western leaders that Moscow was preparing for war in 2029 or 2030. Throughout this week, Russia has accused Nato of preparing to blockade its territory, which borders Lithuania and Poland, warning that it would even be prepared to use nuclear weapons if the West tried to cut off Kaliningrad from the rest of Russia. Nato has sought to calm the situation, stressing it is a defensive alliance and urging Moscow to stop its nuclear threats. Western allies have faced a surge in so-called hybrid warfare incidents blamed on Russia, particularly in Poland and the Baltics in recent months.

To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. When Vladimir Putin arrived to address Russia's parliament on Wednesday, a warm welcome was guaranteed. The Special Election Operation, as one Russian newspaper dubbed last month's legislative vote, has produced a State Duma even more pro-Putin than anything before it. The ruling party, United Russia, now has more MPs than ever. It allows the Kremlin to claim it has been handed a huge mandate from the Russian people.

Estonian Foreign Minister Margus Tsahkna has accused Russia of "sabotage" following an August arson attack on a defence company, Milrem Robotics, a claim the Kremlin rejected. "We can conclude with certainty that the arson attack in Tallinn was an act of sabotage ordered by the special services of the Russian Federation," Tsahkna wrote on X on Tuesday. "This act of sabotage is part of Russia's broader campaign across Europe, aimed at intimidating us and weakening our support for Ukraine," he wrote. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov rejected the allegation. "Such statements are baseless, ill-considered, have absolutely no relation to reality, and lack any form of reasoning. Consequently, we cannot and will not take such statements seriously," he told reporters.

A fire at a Starlink satellite station in central Poland was a deliberate act of sabotage, a government minister has said. Polish Deputy Prime Minister Krzysztof Gawkowski said the fire in the Masovian Voivodeship province was deliberately designed to disable the station... disrupting internet access for various institutions, including the Ukrainian army. He told Polish public broadcaster TVP Info an investigation was ongoing but many indications suggest the attack fits into a new Russian doctrine of attack. The Kremlin has not commented. Meanwhile, Denmark's intelligence service issued a new threat assessment saying it expects Russia to escalate hybrid warfare in the coming months.

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