France is planning a second meeting with Western leaders to discuss Ukraine and European security. European countries that were not present at the previous meeting, as well as Canada, have been invited.
Reuters reports this, citing sources.
Among those invited to the second meeting are Norway, Canada, Lithuania, Estonia, Latvia, the Czech Republic, Greece, Finland, Romania, Sweden and Belgium. Some of the leaders of these countries may join via video link.
French President Emmanuel Macron organized the first emergency meeting with EU leaders on February 17, amid the US announcing the start of negotiations with Russia to end the war in Ukraine without the participation of Europe and Kyiv.
The participants of the first meeting were European Council President António Costa, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte, Prime Ministers of Denmark, Spain and Poland Mette Frederiksen, Pedro Sanchez and Donald Tusk, as well as German Chancellor Olaf Scholz.
One of the key issues was sending troops to Ukraine to monitor a possible peace deal. This was also the main argument of the evening. Macron proposed placing European peacekeeping forces behind the future demarcation line in Ukraine, rather than directly on it. Germany, Italy, Spain and Poland opposed it.
Europeʼs participation in the settlement of the war in Ukraine
After the US President Donald Trump reported that during a phone call with Putin they agreed to immediately begin peace talks, the foreign ministers of Ukraine, France, the United Kingdom, Spain, Italy, Poland, Germany, and the European Union stressed in a statement that Ukraine and Europe must be part of any negotiations to end the Russian-Ukrainian war.
At the Munich Security Conference, Trumpʼs special envoy Keith Kellogg said that Europe would not be physically at the negotiating table between Russia and Ukraine, but its interests would be taken into account. He added that one of the reasons why previous peace talks failed was that they involved too many countries.
The Axios publication, which revealed the details of the conversation between Zelensky and Trump, noted that the US president supported the idea of deploying European peacekeeping forces in Ukraine — this could become one of the security guarantees.
After that, the Associated Press wrote that a group of European countries were privately working on a plan to send troops to Ukraine to help with post-war security.
The Financial Times noted that the US has asked European countries to submit detailed proposals for the weapons, peacekeeping troops and security measures they could provide to Ukraine as part of any security guarantees. The United States wants to gauge Europe’s willingness to defend Ukraine after a peaceful settlement and determine the price Europe is willing to pay in exchange for participating in negotiations with Moscow.
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