European leaders cannot imagine a meeting with Putin without rather a ceasefire. “I don’t know if it’s necessary,” argues Trump. Before they met private, European leaders and Trump spoke to the press
Among the constant thanks and compliments of the part between Zelensky, Trump and the European leaders who were present at the White House Meeting to discuss safety guarantees, there was a theme that marked a clear distinction of strategies on how to deal with Moscow. Most European leaders, including the German chancellor and the French president, want a ceasefire of the conflict in Ukraine before a meeting with Putin. Donald Trump has, for now, this hypothesis.
During negotiations in the Oval Room, where there will be an agreement on safety guarantees – -the US President was clear by passing the message to the European allies. “At this moment,” he said, “it’s not on the table” – “that” is a ceasefire. Still, he stressed that he likes “the idea of ceasefire because we immediately stop the killing while we work in lasting peace.”
This statement arises with what Trump had already admitted one day after, where he was face to face with Putin, when he stressed that “the best way to end the terrible war between Russia and Ukraine” is to go “directly to a peace agreement, which would end up with the war, not a mere agreement of ceasefire, which often does not support itself.” A proposal that does not arise or aligned with Ukraine’s strategy -which has been requiring a temporary ceasefire as a first step towards a comprehensive agreement -, nor with the vision of some European leaders -who are useful in establishing a truce before an eventual trilateral meeting with Russia.
It was Friedrich Merz, the German Chancellor of whom Trump praised the bronze, who most insisted on this solution while at the table with Donald Trump. “We would all like to see a ceasefire.… I can’t imagine that the next meeting takes place without a ceasefire. So let’s work for it and try to press Russia as a result of potential trilateral meeting,” said Merz. A position accompanied by French President Emmanuel Macron, who ensured that a ceasefire is necessary “at least to stop the murders. It is a necessity and we all support this idea.”
But Trump, for now, does not appear to change the conviction he has defended after the meeting with Putin. “All of us, obviously, would prefer an immediate ceasefire while we work in lasting peace. And maybe something like this can happen. But at this moment, this is not happening. I don’t know if it is necessary,” he added Monday.
Family photo taken at the White House during the meeting between Trump, Zelensky and several European leaders / Getty
Although Putin was not present at the meeting, Donald Trump made a point of putting his arguments at stake with European leaders. “I have known him a long time ago, I always had a great relationship with him. I think President Putin also wants to find an answer. We’ll see,” said the US President, adding that he expects a trilateral meeting between Russia, Ukraine and the United States soon. “I think the question is whenno to.”
For Macron, however, this issue should also be widened to European allies, insisting that when it comes to security guarantees, there is not only security for Ukraine but from all over Europe. “In order to have a lasting peace for Ukraine and for the whole continent you must have credible security guarantees. The first is a credible Ukrainian army for the coming decades,” he said, adding that Europeans are “quite lucid” about having to pay their part to defend the continent.
Moreover, European leaders have also tried to position Donald Trump more and more on the Ukraine side, repeating an argument: being for peace means supporting Ukraine in the conflict with Russia
