The Ukrainian president, Volodimir Zelenski, requested this Saturday the creation of European armed forces to defend the Russian continent and force the United States to have Europe when making their geopolitical decisions.
“The time has come to create the Armed Forces of Europe,” said the Ukrainian President at the Munich Security Conference, in which he focused his speech on asking European leaders to make the necessary decisions so that “the future of Europe depends only on Europeans. ”
Zelenski also explained that the US president Donald Trump did not mention even the role of Europe in the negotiations between Ukraine and Russia that promotes during the recent phone call, and said that the continent “must have a chair in the Table ”in which his future is decided.
“No decision on Ukraine without Ukraine; No decision on Europe without Europe, ”said kyiv leader in the line of what was expressed in the Munich Conference by many European leaders concerned about the way in which the US has begun to maintain contacts with Russia and Ukraine without asking for opinion or Consult the European Union and its member countries.
The Ukrainian president urged European leaders to form their own unitary army so that the US does not see the continent simply “as a market”, but also “with an ally” with which he is obliged to count.
Zelenski added, expressly addressing the NATO Secretary General, Mark Rutte, present at the hearing, that the European army that claims would not be a substitute for the Atlantic Alliance, but a way of equalizing the European contribution to that of the US, a requirement Trump has been doing since his first term.
The Ukrainian head of state appealed to the EU unity to deal with all these challenges. “If it is not Brussels, it will be Moscow. It is your decision, ”he said.
NATO prepares the land to increase military spending
The NATO general secretary, Mark Rutte, asked the European states of the Alliance to join the debate on peace in Ukraine but not “complaining” about whether or not they will be present in the conversations, but with “concrete” proposals in Areas such as safety guarantees for kyiv after conflict.
Rutte expressed himself in that regard in a panel organized during the Munich Security Conference, in which, however, he acknowledged that what he now sees among the European allies is that they are “entering the specific planning phase” of how they could contribute. He also said that in NATO there is “a clear and common understanding and commitment that you have to ensure that Ukraine is in the best possible position during peace conversations.”
“That means continuing with training in Ukraine, continuing with all the supply of weapons, but also that the result of peace conversations must be that Ukraine is a country that will never be challenged by the Russians,” he said. “It has to be a lasting peace. The Americans and Europeans absolutely agree on this, ”he continued.
The Ally Secretary stressed that there is “an absolute commitment of the United States, including the new administration, with NATO, but also an expectation that on the European side they have to spend more.” “[EEUU] It is right. We are not spending enough, ”said Routte, who added that the NATO leaders in June in Hague will be the new defense spending figure for the allies.
“We cannot defend ourselves in four or five years if we stay at 2% [del PIB]”He said in reference to the current spending commitment of NATO countries in defense and, in this regard, he said that the future spending figure will be” much more than 2%. ” Spain resists this increase in military spending that the countries of the East of the continent have long claimed.
The American Republican senator Lindsey Graham also participated in the debate, who considered that one of the security guarantees for Ukraine should be his immediate entry into NATO if after the current war is again attacked by Russia.
Democratic senator Jeanne Shaheen considered that the possibility that Ukraine enters the Alliance as part of the agreement should not have been removed from the table of peace negotiations, as the US government did this week. “You never start a negotiation from a weakness of weakness, so you never take away your advantage of the table,” said Shaheen, who added that US Secretary of Defense, Pete Hegseth, “was wrong” this week in his statements.
Alert of a possible visit from Trump to Moscow
Zelenski has also warned Trump this Saturday that the Kremlin leader Vladimir Putin tries to manipulate him to get the military parade on May 9 in the Red Square in Moscow. That day is celebrated by the 80th anniversary of the Soviet victory over Nazi Germany in World War II.
“Putin will try that Trump is standing in the Red Square on May 9, but not as a respected leader but as a sting for his show,” Zelenski said in Munich, after the US president and the head of the Kremlin spoke on Wednesday of possible reciprocal visits to their countries in a telephone conversation.
Last Wednesday Trump made his first official call to Putin since his return to the White House. The US president praised the willingness of the Russian leader to move towards peace and highlighted the potential for collaboration between the two countries. The positive tone of Trump’s message caused restlessness in Ukraine. After talking with Putin, Trump called Zelenski to inform him of the conversation content.
The contacts at the highest level between Washington and kyiv to promote a negotiation that ends the war continued this Friday with the first meeting of Zelenski with the US vice president, JD Vance, the Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, and with the representative Trump special for war, Keith Kellogg, which will visit Ukraine on February 20.
Trump, after the rare minerals of Ukraine
As Eldiaria.es has been informing in recent weeks, the main interest of the new White House in the end of the war between Russia and Ukraine part of the US strategic need to ensure the influence of rare minerals for its industry: a requirement which evidenced on February 4 the US President.
As the Washington Post journalist said Friday Josh RoginUkrainian President Volodimir Zelenski received from the US ambassador to Ukraine, Bridget Brink, several days ago a draft of the text of Agreement that Treasury Secretary Scott Besent delivered to the administration of Ukraine last Wednesday.
In this “economic agreement”, as defined by Zelenski himself, Ukraine would guarantee the United States the rights over 50% of all future mineral reserves of Ukraine. According to this journalist and have confirmed the Reuters agency and several Ukrainian media, Zelenski presented on Friday the agreement to different European leaders in the framework of the Munich Conference and declared that “it cannot sign it” since the security guarantees are not included necessary for your country.
Sanchez demands that Europe be in conversations
The president of the Government, Pedro Sánchez, has claimed this Saturday that any conversation about the security of Europe has “at the table with the Europeans.” Sánchez, who has defended the “multilateralism” against those who want to break with international law, has warned that when peace negotiations are opened, any future has to go through “the prominence and leadership of Ukraine.”
The president has made these statements in San Sebastián during the first day of the Tenth Congress of the PSE-EE of Euskadi, where he has focused his speech on alerting the danger of the ultra-right, “both the Spanish and the international”, already the one he has called to fight with the application of progressive policies.
In addition, he has claimed the Popular Party to break “every agreement” with those who act as a “Trojan horse” and want to “fall to Europe from within” and have appealed to international law, “particularly humanitarian.”
Pedro Sánchez, has also warned that no real estate operation “will cover the crimes against humanity” that have been experienced in Gaza in recent years. “From Spain we will not allow it,” he said, and has claimed that the Palestinians live in Palestine and the Israelis in Israel: “In peace, harmony and safely.”
European leaders ask not to assume concessions
The president of the European Council, António Costa, warned this Saturday in Munich that it would be a “big mistake” to assume any type of concession before negotiating peace in Ukraine and asked not to “reward the aggressor” and to ensure that Russia is not a “Threat” for Europe and the rest of the world “never again.”
“Only Ukraine can determine when there are conditions for a negotiation. Assuming concessions before any negotiation is a big mistake, ”Costa said in a speech at the Security Conference held this week in the German city, where he warned that“ an integral peace cannot be a simple high fire ”or” or ” You can give Russia the opportunity to attack never again. He cannot reward the aggressor, ”he said.
A future peace agreement “must guarantee that Russia is no longer a threat to Ukraine, for Europe, for its neighbors. That Russia ceases to be a threat to international security, ”he said. For Costa, a “integral, fair and lasting peace” means that peace in Ukraine and the security of Europe “cannot be separated” because, he stressed, “the Russian threat goes further.” Therefore, the EU will fully assume its “responsibilities” in the future Peace Agreement in Ukraine, and reiterated that “there will be no credible and successful negotiations, nor a lasting peace, without Ukraine and without the European Union.”
“Our defense expenditure increased by 30% since 2021. The countries of the European Union that are in NATO now spend, on average, 2% in defense. Together we have reached the goal, ”Costa said later, to promise that the EU will make” more “because” we know that peace without defense is an illusion. ”
In March, he said, the European Commission and the High EU representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy will present the first proposals to “act better, with more strength and faster in the construction of the Europe of Defense”.
The president of the commission, Ursula von der Leyen, announced the eve that will propose to activate the escape clause of the European fiscal rules, which authorizes to deviate from the debt and deficit limits, to allow member states to invest more in defense, While the German Chancellor, Olaf Scholz, proposed today “an exception in the EU stability pact for all investments in defense equipment that exceed the previous limit of 2% of NATO.”
For its part, the Danish Prime Minister, Mette Frederiksen, said Saturday that the objective of Europeans has to be that Ukraine won war. “It’s about Ukraine winning war, that is the plan. The Ukraine War not only has to do with Ukraine but with whether or not the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, is allowed to decide on Europe, ”he said.
In turn, the president of France, Emmanuel Macron, assured the Ukrainian president, Volodimir Zelenski on Friday, which will help him so that “the Ukrainians are those who lead the conversations that lead to a solid and lasting peace”, after A telephone interview between them.
Already this Saturday afternoon, the Polish Foreign Minister Radosław Sikorski declared, as Reuters reported, that “the credibility of the United States depends on how this war ends.” “Not only from the Trump administration, but from the United States itself,” he emphasized.
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