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The United Kingdom has moved away from a proposal from French President Emmanuel Macron for an initial truce of a limited month between Russia and Ukraine, while kyiv raised reserves on the stop of combat without security guarantee.
The differences emerged after a summit of London in which the largest powers in Europe sought to project the unit and to develop a common plan following a disastrous meeting of the White House between US President Donald Trump and his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
Macron said after the Sunday summit that his idea for a limited one month’s limited ceasefire “in the air, at sea and on energy infrastructure” would have the advantage of checking the intentions of Russia. The French president has a dossier of floating political ideas to push the allies to the agreement.
The United Kingdom, which welcomed the summit, said that Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer wanted to move forward with the peace plan “with Momentum”. But the Starmer allies said that the truce of a month was not “a British plan”.
A British official said: “There are various tables on the table, subject to additional discussions with American and European partners, but a one -month truce has not been agreed.”
Macron increased his cease-fire proposal during the summit but did not give explicit details, according to a Western official informed of the discussions. He did not agree with other leaders, but no one either, no one added the person.
A second western civil servant informed of the discussions indicated that it was clear that no other chief was enthusiastic about Macron’s idea, including Zelenskyy. “It is clear that Macron swelled things about it and went too far,” they said.
The British Minister of Armed Forces, Luke Pollard, also warned a break in the fighting in Ukraine on Monday which could allow Russia to regroup.
He told Sky News: “The very real concern that the Ukrainians have is that any short break in the war simply allows the Russians to rearore, regroup and reintegrate.”
Zelenskyy rejected calls to Ukraine to agree on an immediate ceasefire in his war with Russia. Leaving the United Kingdom of the summit, he said it would be a “failure for everyone” if a cessation of hostilities was not accompanied by detailed security guarantees.
He refused to comment on Macron’s proposal.
The French president told Le Figaro on Sunday than a month long in the air and the sea would be easier than supervising a truce on the ground along the whole front line.
“You must understand that the front today is equivalent to the Paris-Budapest line. In the event of a ceasefire, it would be very difficult to verify that the front is respected, “he said.
Macron and Starmer hope that an agreement would imply American coverage for the troops of a “European coalition of the will” deployed to guarantee any cease-fire in Ukraine.
Starmer said that after the summit that if Europe “had to make the big lifting”, “the effort must have strong American support”. The European plan would also see Zelenskyy signing an agreement with the United States to share some of the profits from the exploitation of Ukraine mineral reserves.
This agreement was intended to be concluded on Friday but was not signed after Trump ejected Zelenskyy from the White House following their dispute in the oval office.
Lord Peter Mandelson, an ambassador of the United Kingdom to Washington, urged Zelenskyy to sign the mineral agreement and called on Ukrainian and European leaders to give “unequivocal support for the initiative that President Trump concludes” to negotiate a peace agreement.
In comments according to which Pollard, the British Minister of the Armed Forces, said that a “government policy” was not, Mandelson told ABC: “Ukraine should be the first to engage in a cease-fire and challenge the Russians to follow.”
Zelenskyy said he did not see need to be amends after the confrontation of the White House or to propose a plan to save his relationship with Trump, although he reaffirmed his gratitude to the American people.
“If you don’t have the end of the war and you have no security guarantees, no one is able to control a cease-fire,” said Ukrainian president of Stansted Airport in London while he was preparing to return to kyiv.
Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni also said on Sunday that “the only thing we really can’t afford is a peace that does not last” because it has expressed “reluctance” on some of the Franco-British ideas.
Additional reports by Amy Kazmin in Rome
