On the night of Monday (24 July), Russia launched a wave of drone strikes on Ukrainian grain silos at the Danube river ports of Izmail and Reni, located only 200m from the Ukraine's border with NATO member state Romania. The airstrikes injured six people and damaged grain storage units. Ukraine's Southern Military Command said they shot down three drones out of a total of 15 launched at the facility.

Georgian Prime Minister Irakli Garibashvili on Monday (24 July) said his government was “well-aware” that joining the European Union came with “long-term obligations and responsibilities”, and added it was a “long but rewarding process”. He was speaking in the Croatian capital of Zagreb on his first visit to the country.

Turkish prime minister, Recip Tayip Erdogan, on Monday embarked on a tour of the Gulf region which will see him visiting Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar. The trip, coming shortly after Erdogan's re-election as President, is seen as part of an effort to consolidate a strategic partnership with the Gulf countries, based on new realities that have emerged in recent years. The rift between Turkey and Saudi Arabia and UAE has now been fully healed, and this visit is no longer about fixing the past, but is definitely about charting the future. Economic co-operation, and co-operation in the defence sector are key elements of Erdogan's agenda.

European Union diplomacy is often criticised for not giving enough attention to the countries of the Gulf Co-operation Council (GCC). In a signal that things are about to change, in June it appointed its first Special Representative for the region. The EU has a number of these Special Representatives, know as EUSRs, usually dealing with regions or topics that cannot be addressed through the bilateral delegations that the EU has in most countries of the world. But the announcement that the EU was going to appoint former Italian Prime Minister, Luigi Di Maio, as its first EUSR for the Gulf countries came as a bit of a surprise. Too senior, some said; too much political baggage from his time in Italian politics, said others. But after a brief moment of hesitation the 27 member states finally agreed Di Maio's candidature. This week he finally arrived in the Gulf on his first visit in this role, ahead of an important EU-GCC foreign ministers meeting expected to take place in Oman in October. “I think that the world is changing and there are new partnerships to build,” Di Maio said during an interview on Thursday with the Saudi newspaper Arab News, that touched on topics ranging from the Russia-Ukraine conflict to the economic empowerment of women and young people in the Kingdom.

The Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has agreed to Sweden's membership of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), hours before the military alliance's summit is due to get underway in the Lithuanian capital of Vilnius on Tuesday (11 July). The NATO General Secretary Jens Stoltenberg said on Monday evening (10 July) that President Erdogan would forward Sweden's bid to the Turkish parliament in Ankara and "ensure ratification". He described it as a "historic step" but stressed that a "clear date" for Sweden's formal accession to the organisation could not yet be given as this relies on both the Turkish parliament as well as Prime Minister Viktor Orban of Hungary and the Hungarian parliament. Hungary and Turkey remain the only two NATO members who are not yet to retify Sweden's membership. Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto said on Tuesday that ratification of Sweden's bid is now "only a technical question". Reacting to the news, Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson said: "I am very happy, it is a good day for Sweden."