The leaders of four large European countries threatened to put pressure on Russian President Vladimir Putin if he does not accept an unconditional 30-day cease-fire in Ukraine that they offered on Saturday in a strong demonstration of unit with kyiv.
The leaders of France, the United Kingdom, Germany and Poland said their proposal for a cease-fire to start on Monday was supported by US President Donald Trump, whom they had informed of the phone earlier during the day.
Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told CNN on Saturday that Moscow will have to consider the proposal. Earlier in the day, Peskov reiterated the assertion of Russia that she was ready for peace talks with Ukraine “without conditions”, and accused kyiv of blocking them.
The three-day unilateral ceasefire of Russia, declared for the 80th anniversary of victory over Nazi Germany expires on Saturday, and Ukraine says that Russian forces have violated it several times. In March, the United States proposed an immediate and limited truce of 30 days, which Ukraine accepted, but the Kremlin held the conditions more to its taste.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, addressing journalists alongside European leaders in kyiv, described their meeting as “very important signal”.
In a joint statement, published on the official website of Zelenskyy, the five leaders called for a cease-fire “for at least 30 days” from Monday, to make room for a diplomatic thrust to end the war.
“An unconditional ceasefire by definition cannot be subject to any condition. If Russia calls for such conditions, this can only be considered an effort to prolong war and undermine diplomacy,” the statement said.
French President Emmanuel Macron said the United States would take the lead in monitoring the ceasefire proposed, with the support of European countries, and threatened “massive sanctions … prepared and coordinated between Europeans and the Americans”, if Russia violated the truce.
Macron went to kyiv with British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz and Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk.
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“It is Europe that intensifies, showing our solidarity with Ukraine,” said Starmer.
Retirement Lieutenant Kellogg, Trump’s special envoy in Ukraine, said on Saturday that a 30-day “complete” ceasefire, covering air, land, sea and infrastructure attacks, “will start the process to put an end to the largest and longest war in Europe since the Second World War”.
Meanwhile, Russian President Vladimir Putin organized a series of bilateral talks on Saturday with foreign officials who had attended the own Moscow celebrations marking the defeat of Nazi Germany, in an apparent attempt to underline the West’s failure to isolate it on the world scene. Putin interlocutors included Lam, the secretary general of the Communist Party of Vietnam and the leaders of Zimbabwe, Burkina Faso and the Palestinian Authority.
Europe threatens more sanctions if Russia ignores the ceasefire offer
The progress in finishing the three -year war seemed elusive in the months following Trump’s return to the White House, and his previous allegations of imminent breakthroughs failed to materialize. Trump has already pushed Ukraine to give in the territory to Russia to end the war, threatening to move away from it if an agreement becomes too difficult.
Since the start of mediated talks by the United States, Russia has maintained attacks along the front line of approximately 1,000 kilometers (600 miles), including fatal strikes on residential areas without obvious military targets.
The ceasefire would include a stop of the fighting on land, the sea and in the air. European leaders have threatened to take sanctions, especially in the Russia energy and banks, if Putin did not comply.
The priority was to make Russia too expensive to continue fighting in Ukraine, said Ukrainian Minister for Foreign Affairs Andrii Sybiha.
When asked how the surveillance mechanism would work, Sybiha told the Associated Press that the details were still being discussed.
Tackling skepticism as to whether new sanctions against Moscow, which has so far succeeded in continuing to fight during the war, Merz has said: “Almost all the member states of the European Union and a large coalition of the will in the world are determined to apply these sanctions even if our weekend initiative should fail.”
Managers also discussed security guarantees for Ukraine.
kyiv’s military capacity building will be a key means of deterrent against Russia and will require Ukraine quantities of robust weapons to dissuade future attacks and invest in its defense sector. A force composed of foreign troops could also be deployed as an additional measure of “comfort”, said Macron.
He said details on potential European deployment in Ukraine were still refined. No mention was made to membership in NATO, still kyiv’s first choice for a security guarantee.
Earlier on Saturday, European leaders joined a ceremony in place of kyiv’s independence marking the 80th anniversary of the end of the Second World War. They lit candles alongside Zelenskyy during a makeshift flag memorial for the Ukrainian soldiers and the civilians who have fallen into account since the invasion of Russia.
Russian attacks continue
The Russian bombings in the north of the Sumy region in Ukraine in the last day killed three residents and injured four others, local officials said. Another civilian died on Saturday while a Russian drone struck the southern city of Kherson, according to the regional governor Oleksandr Prokudin.
The United States Embassy in kyiv warned a “potentially significant” Russian air attack on Friday in the coming days, without giving details.
In November, Russia warned the brief American warning before hitting Ukraine for the first time with its oreshnik intermediate ballistic missile, an experimental hypersonic weapon that Putin claimed could travel to 10 times the speed of sound.
The Ukrainian telegram channels have linked the embassy to warn the reports of an imminent flight of Moscow on the military training and launch complex of Kapustin Yar. A similar flight ban preceded the November strike. There was no immediate comments from Russian officials.
Trump said last week that he doubted Putin wanted to end his war in Ukraine, expressing a new skepticism that a peace agreement can be concluded soon, and has referred to new sanctions against Russia.
Ukraine’s European allies consider its fate as fundamental for the security of the continent, and pressure is now rising to find ways to support kyiv militarily, that Trump retires.
