Kyiv brushed off the wobbles on both sides of the Atlantic which excluded aid to Ukraine from an emergency bill to prevent a government shutdown, represented a deeper change in policy.

An official says the decision was taken after an investigation concluded that landowners, local authorities, members of the security forces and humanitarian workers were involved in stealing aid.

The meeting comes as tensions between China and the EU are heightened after the European Commission announced an investigation into whether to impose punitive tariffs on Chinese EVs to protect EU producers.

While the EU has a strong position in the intermediate and assembly phases of making electrolysers, it relies on China for fuel cells and lithium-ion batteries crucial for electric vehicles.

For many EU citizens, gaining access to medical or social services in other member states and getting expenditure on them reimbursed once home can be complicated and require lots of patience and paperwork.

Satellite images highlight the extent of the destruction in the area, with swathes of forest virtually flattened and lush pine trees turned into blackened, skeletal bark.

Sweltering temperatures have affected swathes of the planet, with heat records registered from Death Valley in the US state of California to a northwest China township as Canada and southern Europe battle wildfires.

Solidarity lanes are rail and road transport connections through EU member states that border Ukraine such as Poland and Hungary while the most significant lane is through Romania.

Extreme weather has caused havoc across the planet, with temperatures breaking records in China, the US and southern Europe, sparking forest fires, water shortages and a rise in heat-related hospital admissions.

The new sanctions target six persons and one entity, including the ministers for immigration and population, labour, and health and sports, EU says.

The US was scorched by record-setting heat in the West and South, lashed with flood-triggering rain in the Northeast, and choked by wildfire smoke in the Midwest.

Microsoft has found itself in the EU crosshairs after a complaint by Salesforce-owned workspace messaging app Slack in 2020.