The EU has agreed to US President Donald Trump’s demands to increase defence spending but expressed reluctance over sending troops to Ukraine in case of a potential ceasefire deal.
The leaders agreed that sending troops to Ukraine without securing a peace agreement would be dangerous but they are ready to provide security guarantees to Ukraine “depending on the level of American support,” a European official said.
“We agree with President Trump on a ‘peace through strength’ approach,” the official said.
The meeting in Paris was called by French President Emmanuel Macron after US President Donald Trump arranged bilateral peace talks with Russia, leaving the EU out of the negotiations that are set to begin later on Tuesday.
Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky also said he had a “long” call with the French president on security guarantees.
Trump stunned Ukraine and European allies last week when he announced he had called Russian President Vladimir Putin, long ostracised by the West, to discuss ending the war without consulting them, and they must now confront the reality of a future with less US protection.
On the other hand, Ukraine has said it won’t accept any US-Russia peace deal reached without Kiev.
A peacekeeping force would not only raise the risk of a direct confrontation with Russia, which launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022 but also stretch European armies, whose arsenals have been depleted by supplying Ukraine and decades of relative peace.
Meanwhile, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni said, “It was useful to discuss today the various hypotheses on the table.
The one that foresees the deployment of European soldiers in Ukraine seems to me to be the most complex and perhaps the least effective, and on this too I voiced Italy’s doubts.”
Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen said she was considering troop deployments and that Europe must boost its support for Ukraine while ramping up domestic defence spending.
“Russia is threatening all of Europe now, unfortunately,” she told reporters.
Furthermore, a meeting between top Russian and US officials is set to commence shortly in Riyadh on setting a possible ground for a meeting between Putin and Trump.
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