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‘European power’ needs place at upcoming Ukraine peace talks – ex-UK defense secretary | |
(about 1 hour later) | |
The White House has “made clear” that other Western nations won’t be invited, Ben Wallace has said | The White House has “made clear” that other Western nations won’t be invited, Ben Wallace has said |
A “European power” with “skin in the game” must be allowed to join any peace summit involving Russia, the US, and Ukraine, former UK Defense Secretary Ben Wallace has said. | |
The Kremlin has confirmed that Russian President Vladimir Putin and his US counterpart, Donald Trump, are set to meet “in the coming days.” | |
Washington has expressed hope that the meeting could lead to a trilateral US-Russia-Ukraine peace summit, but Putin has stressed that the conditions for him to meet with Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky are “far off.” | |
“It’s been made clear already by the White House that Europeans won’t be invited,” Wallace said in an interview with Times Radio on Thursday. | “It’s been made clear already by the White House that Europeans won’t be invited,” Wallace said in an interview with Times Radio on Thursday. |
The nations that “have skin in the game” should be part of the “peacemaking process,” he argued. | The nations that “have skin in the game” should be part of the “peacemaking process,” he argued. |
There are two other nuclear powers in NATO – France and Britain – and I think it is important that in the room should be a European power. | There are two other nuclear powers in NATO – France and Britain – and I think it is important that in the room should be a European power. |
Wallace, who was UK defense secretary from 2019 to 2023, has consistently lobbied for British military supplies to Ukraine – a practice that Moscow has argued makes it party to the conflict. | |
France and the UK have increasingly pressed to deploy ‘peacekeeping troops’ to help Ukraine’s battered land forces in the event of a ceasefire, as part of a ‘coalition of the willing’. Russia has said it would regard the move as a military intervention, and warned that any NATO troops would be considered hostile. | |
Moscow considers Kiev’s ambition to join the US-led military bloc one of the main causes of the conflict. One of Russia’s key peace demands is that Ukraine accept neutral status outside of NATO. | |
Wallace expressed skepticism that Western European nations would agree to any of Moscow’s peace demands. | |
UK interference has previously been blamed for derailing peace efforts, most notably when then-Prime Minister Boris Johnson discouraged Kiev from engaging in early negotiations with Moscow in 2022, according to the Ukrainian head negotiator at the time, David Arakhamia. | UK interference has previously been blamed for derailing peace efforts, most notably when then-Prime Minister Boris Johnson discouraged Kiev from engaging in early negotiations with Moscow in 2022, according to the Ukrainian head negotiator at the time, David Arakhamia. |
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