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A bunch of European leaders convened in Paris for an emergency meeting on Monday, nonetheless reeling from a weekend throughout which their long-standing means to depend on the US for help was thrown into query and forward of a meeting between U.S. and Russian representatives in Saudi Arabia that they had been excluded from.
Monday’s emergency assembly, convened by French President Emmanuel Macron, included the leaders of the UK, Germany, Poland, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, and Denmark, in addition to European Fee President Ursula von der Leyen and NATO Secretary-Normal Mark Rutte. It got here shut on the heels of the Munich Safety Convention, the place U.S. Vice President J.D. Vance gave a speech accusing European international locations of straying from “democratic values” over their opposition to far-right political events and what Vance characterised as extreme censorship.
A bunch of European leaders convened in Paris for an emergency meeting on Monday, nonetheless reeling from a weekend throughout which their long-standing means to depend on the US for help was thrown into query and forward of a meeting between U.S. and Russian representatives in Saudi Arabia that they had been excluded from.
Monday’s emergency assembly, convened by French President Emmanuel Macron, included the leaders of the UK, Germany, Poland, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, and Denmark, in addition to European Fee President Ursula von der Leyen and NATO Secretary-Normal Mark Rutte. It got here shut on the heels of the Munich Safety Convention, the place U.S. Vice President J.D. Vance gave a speech accusing European international locations of straying from “democratic values” over their opposition to far-right political events and what Vance characterised as extreme censorship.
His remarks—coupled with U.S. Protection Secretary Pete Hegseth’s statement earlier that week that Ukraine’s membership in NATO was not a “reasonable” end result of a possible negotiated settlement to finish the battle and U.S. President Donald Trump’s unilateral decision to start out direct negotiations with Russian President Vladimir Putin to finish the Ukraine battle—left many European leaders feeling shocked and sidelined.
In Munich, senior European officers stuck to the central message they’ve been placing ahead for months, regardless of Vance’s speech and the acknowledgment that Europe should contribute extra to its personal protection. “There shall be no peace in Ukraine with out Ukraine or Europe,” Estonian Protection Minister Hanno Pevkur informed Overseas Coverage on the sidelines of the convention.
However the Trump administration doesn’t appear to be heeding that message. U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio and his Russian counterpart, Sergey Lavrov, met within the Saudi capital of Riyadh on Tuesday, the place the 2 sides agreed to start talks to attain peace in Ukraine and extra broadly enhance U.S.-Russia relations. No Ukrainian or European representatives had been included, and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky postponed his personal go to to Saudi Arabia scheduled for Wednesday.
“There may be now a form of ideological convergence between Moscow and Washington in opposition to Europeans,” stated Thomas Gomart, director of the Paris-based suppose tank Institut Français des Relations Internationales, describing the Trump administration’s stance as a “strategic present, which has been given to Putin for nearly nothing at this stage.”
The issue, even for Europe’s strongest nations, is that they can not appear to agree on the way to proceed.
Macron, who skipped the Munich Safety Convention, has tried to play interlocutor, chatting with Trump before and after Monday’s emergency assembly, when he additionally spoke to Zelensky. “We are going to work on this along with all Europeans, People, and Ukrainians,” he wrote in a post on X. “That is the important thing.” France is reportedly planning to host a second assembly on Wednesday with different European nations that weren’t included in Monday’s assembly, in addition to North American ally Canada.
U.Ok. Prime Minister Keir Starmer wrote in an op-ed within the Telegraph on Sunday that he could be prepared to commit British peacekeeping troops to Ukraine if a peace deal is reached. Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk, however, told reporters categorically on Monday that Poland is not going to ship troops to Ukraine, whereas German Chancellor Olaf Scholz—going through a snap election subsequent week—stated it was “inappropriate” to debate peacekeeping troops earlier than a peace deal is reached.
“For Europeans, there may be this concept that if a cease-fire is basically carried out, Ukraine ought to proceed to be supported and perhaps Europeans ought to be capable to present safety ensures,” Gomart stated. “Having stated that, there may be deep division amongst them relating to the safety ensures, and there may be additionally division when it comes to what kind of army danger Europeans are able to take by themselves.”
