Fox News and others have toed president’s line – seemingly hoping unrest abroad will make people vote Republican

Donald Trump sought to capitalize on the scenes of unrest in France, telling a crowd in Kansas on Monday that “migrants” and “communists” were responsible, and that the scenes were “what the radical ‘Dumocrats’ want to do to America”.

As Republicans struggle to convince voters across the country ahead of November’s midterm elections, Trump’s allies in the conservative media have followed suit, seemingly hoping that the scenes in France can scare people to the polls.

Europe’s leaders can no longer trust a word that comes out of Washington. No more slaps on the wrist – we need concrete steps to punish Trump

Historical comparisons are always inexact. No one conflict precisely mirrors another. Yet Donald Trump’s shameless appeasement of Vladimir Putin carries more than a noxious whiff of Neville Chamberlain’s failed attempt in Munich in 1938 to head off war with Nazi Germany. To be fair to the former UK prime minister – and history largely hasn’t been – his peacemaking efforts had the enthusiastic backing of most people in Britain and France who, like him, were desperate to avoid a repeat of the horrors of the first world war. Trump enjoys no equivalent public support for his treachery. Nor does he face the prospect of a US war with Russia. His betrayal of Ukraine is cynically self-interested, globally dangerous and utterly contemptible.

US-Russian talks on agreeing the shoddy terms of a precedent-setting American sell-out of Ukraine are at an advanced stage, after meetings in St Petersburg this week. Trump has zigzagged over the war ever since returning to office. Now, panicked by record-low poll ratings, he seems determined to scapegoat Ukraine and force its de facto capitulation. Recent steps – his shocking decision to fund Putin’s war machine by buying Russian diesel, his waiving of tougher sanctions, his mysterious, lethal interruptions in US satellite and intelligence sharing with Kyiv, and his renewed attempt to oust Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy – mark Trump out as the skulking Judas, the craven Brutus of the modern age. He makes Chamberlain look like a man of iron principle. All that’s lacking is an umbrella.

Simon Tisdall is a Guardian foreign affairs commentator

Experts say Russia is trying to destroy energy infrastructure before winter and US ‘appeasement and flattery’ will not achieve peace

Russia has carried out a massive “demonstrative” attack on Ukraine, bombarding Kyiv with ballistic missiles just hours after Vladimir Putin said he had agreed to resume trilateral negotiations after talks with the US envoy Steve Witkoff.

Overnight, Moscow pounded the Ukrainian capital, killing at least two people and wounding 22, including four children. Targets included the southern bridge over the Dnipro River, civilian houses, energy infrastructure, an ambulance station, office buildings and a clinic.

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Ukrainian military sources say they are yet to see any change in satellite internet speeds

Russia frees Stephen Hubbard after US request while Steve Witkoff praises Putin, wanted by ICC as war criminal, as a ‘humanitarian’

Vladimir Putin ordered the release of an American man from a Russian jail as he met Donald Trump’s envoy Steve Witkoff in St Petersburg on Wednesday for fresh talks on ending the war in Ukraine, amid increasingly close relations between Moscow and Washington.

Trump had previously asked Putin to free Stephen Hubbard, a 74-year-old former teacher who had spent more than four years in Russian jails on charges of fighting as a mercenary for Ukraine.

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The talks came more than two years since Donald Trump promised in his election campaign to end the Ukraine war within 24 hours

At least six people have been left injured in the ballistic missile attack

GOP lawmakers threaten to pull support for president’s agenda after Russia diesel deal and sanctions pause

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A handful of Republicans have spoken out against Donald Trump’s softening stance on Russia, threatening to pull financial support for his agenda over his “embarrassing” handling of the Ukraine war.

Don Bacon, an outgoing congressman in Nebraska, condemned Trump’s actions – which include a stunning agreement to buy Russian diesel and the pausing of sanctions on Moscow – as “absolutely disgraceful” and accused the US president of cozying up to a “war criminal” in Vladimir Putin, his Russian counterpart.

Four others were killed in Nova Vodolaha, including an eight-year-old girl. Ukraine’s president called the attack ‘pure atrocity’

Kyiv has tried desperately to keep the United States on side since Trump returned to office. But the Ukrainian president may now feel the relationship is beyond saving, writes James C. Reynolds

Fighting raged on the frontlines as Volodymyr Zelensky tried to repair fractured relations with the US

A Sofia court has cleared European arrest warrants for two 19-year-old Germans charged with setting fire to Starlink antennas south of the Bulgarian capital, a court spokeswoman told dpa. Prosecutors named the pair in court, but both had already left Bulgaria. The case adds Bulgaria to a run of attacks on Starlink sites in Europe, which Poland and Lithuania have linked to Russia.

While Russia presses its assault along the front and strikes Ukraine’s cities, Starlink keeps Ukraine’s drone units and front-line troops connected, and Poland pays about $50 million a year for its terminals. The network’s ground links in Europe are now a target in their own right, and ISW has linked the Polish fire to a wider Russian pattern of sabotage. Each attack on a ground station hits a network whose speed caps already disrupted Ukraine’s drone missions this month.

Two names, a few hours in Bulgaria

Prosecutors identified the suspects as Zeka Islam and Tirpan Beytullah, Bulgaria’s state news agency BTA reported, noting the names may be misspelled. Their whereabouts are unknown, according to German authorities cited by the agency. They were charged in absentia on 14 October and face three to 12 years in prison if convicted.

According to the indictment, the two crossed from Serbia at the Kalotina checkpoint at 17:37 on 9 October and told border officers they were tourists. At about 22:25, wearing gloves and masks, they allegedly set fire to antennas at the Plana teleport, a satellite ground station near the village of Plana. They drove back into Serbia through the same checkpoint at 23:55.

Three antennas burned completely, two were partly damaged, and three more were affected, prosecutors say. The pair traveled in a Volkswagen with German plates, and a national warrant followed two days after the charges, ZDF reported.

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The court-appointed lawyers argued that investigators had pinned down the vehicle, not the men in it. The court rejected those objections, finding reasonable grounds to suspect the pair. The lawyers said they would appeal. The ruling can be challenged within three days.

An opposition MP made the fire public three days later

The fire became public only on 12 October, when opposition MP Ivaylo Mirchev of Democratic Bulgaria posted about it on Facebook. He said 11 antennas had been set on fire, more than prosecutors later counted.

In parliament two days later, Prime Minister Rumen Radev asked the head of the State Agency for National Security (DANS) not to reveal details, saying disclosure could harm the investigation. DANS head Plamen Tonchev told lawmakers he believes the fire was sabotage and that more such attacks cannot be ruled out, dpa reported.

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After the ruling, Mirchev wrote that Radev personally owes the public an explanation of what has been achieved, BTA reported.

Bulgaria’s case joins attacks Poland and Lithuania tie to Russia

Bulgaria has not said who might be behind the fire. Authorities in Poland and Lithuania have linked similar recent arsons on Starlink equipment to Russia.

In September, fire hit a Starlink ground station south of Warsaw, and Germany later detained two suspects. On 18 October, Lithuania’s prime minister said intruders had tried to burn a company’s Starlink antennas used by Ukraine, calling it part of Russia’s hybrid war. Moscow claims such accusations are baseless, Reuters reported.

US envoy Steve Witkoff to meet Putin in Russia as Trump called on Ukraine to make a deal to settle the war

President at Kansas rally tries to turn protests into cautionary tale for US as Republicans face potential midterm losses

• Explainer: why are people protesting across Europe?

As Republicans confront mounting political headwinds ahead of November’s midterm elections, Donald Trump is attempting to turn unrest in France into a cautionary tale for American voters, recasting the demonstrations that began as student protests against crumbling schools and the soaring cost of living as evidence of the dangers of immigration and the erosion of western civilization.

At a rally in Kansas on Monday evening, Trump described France as a once-great nation that had been “conquered, looted, and burned to the ground by migrants, jihadists, and communists”.

DHS says migrants ‘retain protections’ after temporary protected status was set to expire on Monday

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More than 100,000 people from Ukraine and Sudan can stay in the United States without immediate risk of deportation, the Department of Homeland Security said, in what amounts to a temporary reprieve after their right to stay in the country was set to expire on Monday.

Temporary protected status was set to end on Monday for about 101,000 Ukrainians and 1,800 Sudanese. But the DHS said an announcement “will be made at the appropriate time”. Until then, the department said in a written statement, Ukrainians and Sudanese in the US covered by those temporary measures “retain protection”. The department did not indicate how long they could stay or when a final announcement would be made on their status.