Ukraine on Saturday accused Russia of undermining negotiations to end their almost four-year war by launching fresh deadly strikes, as officials from both countries and the United States met for a second day of direct talks in Abu Dhabi.

The United Nations rights chief decried Friday that "thousands" of people, including children, had died in Iran's crackdown on nationwide protests, and urged the authorities to "end their brutal repression".

Speaking at the start of a U.N. Human Rights Council urgent meeting on the situation in Iran, Volker Turk urged the authorities in Tehran "to reconsider, to pull back, and to end their brutal repression".

U.S. President Donald Trump provoked outrage and distress in the U.K. on Friday with his suggestion that troops from NATO countries stayed away from the frontline during the war in Afghanistan.

In an interview with Fox News in Davos, Switzerland, on Thursday, Trump said he was not sure NATO would be there to support the U.S. if and when requested.

U.S. President Donald Trump on Thursday withdrew an invite for Canada's Prime Minister Mark Carney to join his newly constituted "Board of Peace."

"Please let this Letter serve to represent that the Board of Peace is withdrawing its invitation to you regarding Canada's joining," Trump posted on his Truth Social platform.

President Volodymyr Zelensky said negotiating teams from Washington, Moscow and Kyiv would discuss territorial control of Ukraine's eastern Donbas region at talks beginning Friday in the United Arab Emirates.

"The Donbas is a key issue. It will be discussed in the modality that the three parties see fit in Abu Dhabi today and tomorrow," Zelensky told journalists, including from AFP, in an online briefing.

Russian President Vladimir Putin discussed the settlement in Ukraine with U.S. President Donald Trump's envoys during marathon overnight talks, and the Kremlin insisted that the territorial issue needs to be resolved to reach a peace deal.

The Kremlin meeting, which lasted past 3 a.m. Friday, came hours after Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskyy sharply criticized his European allies Thursday for what he cast as their slow and fragmented response to Russia's nearly four-year full-scale invasion that he said has left Ukraine at the mercy of Putin amid an ongoing U.S. push for a peace settlement.

The toll in Iran's bloody crackdown on nationwide protests has reached at least 5,002 people killed, activists said Friday, warning many more were feared dead as the most comprehensive internet blackout in the country's history crossed the two-week mark.

The challenge in getting information out of Iran persists due to authorities cutting off access to the internet on Jan. 8, even as tensions rise between the United States and Iran as an American aircraft carrier group moves closer to the Middle East — a force U.S. President Donald Trump likened to an "armada" in comments to journalists late Thursday.

France's navy, with the help of allies, on Thursday boarded a tanker alleged to be from Russia's "shadow fleet" in the Mediterranean, President Emmanuel Macron said.

"This morning, the French Navy boarded and searched an oil tanker from Russia, subject to international sanctions and suspected of flying a false flag," he said on X.

Denmark's prime minister insisted that her country can't negotiate on its sovereignty on Thursday after U.S. President Donald Trump said he agreed on a "framework of a future deal" on Arctic security with the head of NATO. Trump said the outcome would be "all the military access we want" to Greenland.

Trump on Wednesday abruptly scrapped the tariffs he had threatened to impose on eight European nations to press for U.S. control over Greenland, a semiautonomous territory of NATO ally Denmark. It was a dramatic reversal hours after he insisted he wanted to get the island "including right, title and ownership" — though he also said he would not use force.

U.S. President Donald Trump said he had a "good" meeting with Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky in Davos on Thursday, and called for Russia's war on Kyiv to end.

"This war has to end," Trump told reporters including AFP when asked what his message was to Russian President Vladimir Putin, who will meet the US leader's envoy in Moscow later.