- Russia‘s foreign ministry warned against Western military intervention in Ukraine.
- A group of European leaders, including Volodymyr Zelenskyy, met on Thursday to discuss the war.
- Discussions among European leaders are ongoing about possible security guarantees for Ukraine.
As European leaders met on Thursday to discuss security guarantees for Ukraine, Russia’s foreign ministry warned that the nation will not accept the presence of Western troops in Ukraine as part of a future peace deal.
“Russia does not intend to discuss unacceptable foreign intervention in Ukraine in any form whatsoever,” spokesperson Maria Zakharova said in comments published by the Foreign Ministry on Thursday, according to ABC News. “Western war instigators view Ukraine as a testing ground for their military developments.”
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy met with European leaders in Paris on Thursday, along with President Donald Trump’s envoy Steve Witkoff. The leaders met to discuss ongoing efforts to end Russia’s war against Ukraine, including security guarantees for Zelenskyy’s war-torn country, per CBS News.
Since taking office in January, Trump has been pushing for Russia and Ukraine to strike a deal to bring an end to the war, which started when Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022.
As attempts to negotiate an end to the war have taken place, Russia has repeatedly turned down proposals for Western forces to be deployed in Ukraine in any capacity as part of a deal to end the war.
Even so, the prospect is still being discussed by NATO leaders and the Ukrainian government as Kyiv sees security guarantees as necessary to facilitate a peace deal, per ABC News.
Zakharova said Thursday that the protections under discussion “are not security guarantees for Ukraine, they are guarantees of threat to the European continent.”
On Wednesday, during a visit to Beijing, Russian President Vladimir Putin said that he is willing to end the war by force if Ukraine does not agree to his demands, per NBC News. He also suggested he would meet with Zelenskyy, but only in Moscow.
The ‘Coalition of the Willing’
The various leaders who met in Paris did so as part of the informal “Coalition of the Willing.” The group said it is willing to provide the security guarantees that Ukraine said are necessary for it to be confident any ceasefire would hold.
Ukraine is wary of a ceasefire because of worries that it could be used by Russia to rearm, regroup and launch other attacks on Ukraine and other European countries. That’s why it believes security guarantees are essential, per ABC News.
French President Emmanuel Macron, who hosted the talks, said that after months of planning “we are ready as Europeans to offer security guarantees to Ukraine and the Ukrainian people the day a peace deal is signed,” per NBC News. He did not provide any details.
The meeting included Zelenskyy, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, British Prim Minister Keir Starmer and NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte.
According to NBC News, Starmer’s office said that during the meeting he “emphasized that the group had an unbreakable pledge to Ukraine, with President Trump’s backing, and it was clear they now needed to go even further to apply pressure on Putin to secure a cessation of hostilities.”
Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez was also set to attend but a technical problem forced his plane to turn around, so he joined the meeting virtually.
What Trump said about the meeting
The leaders gathered in Paris held a video conference with Trump after their meeting, per CBS News. He offered to provide American support as a “backstop” but said this initiative of security guarantees must be led by the Europeans.
According to CBS News, a White House official confirmed the call and said that Trump “emphasized that Europe must stop purchasing Russian oil that is funding the war — as Russia received 1.1 billion euros in fuel sales from the EU in one year.”
The U.S. president also urged the European leaders to “place economic pressure on China for funding Russia’s war efforts.”
Since the war in Ukraine began, European nations have reduced their purchases of Russian fossil fuels but they have not ended, per CBS News. These European Union countries are working to replace the Russian gas and oil with fuels from other places, but they had become reliant on the cheap Russian energy over many years.