Historic meeting at the White House. Von der Leyen: Ukraine must become a steel hedgehog. But Macron: Putin doesn't want peace.
Territory and security guarantees. Today, in Washington, the second act of negotiations to end the war in Ukraine begins with these dossiers. Great progress has been made on Russia, stay tuned, warns Donald Trump on his Truth platform. The American president, writes the German newspaper Bild, will first receive Volodymyr Zelensky at the White House, around lunchtime. Then the two will be joined by seven European leaders, in a format unprecedented in the recent history of American diplomacy. Yesterday, at Zelensky's urging, they stepped forward one by one. Among those attending will be German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, French President Emmanuel Macron, Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, Finnish President Alexander Stubb, NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte, and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen.
The meeting in the American capital should serve to restore some order in the Western camp and, therefore, to verify whether the conditions are in place to move on to the third act, perhaps the decisive one: the trilateral summit between Trump, Putin, and Zelensky. The Trump administration is pushing to organize it by Friday, August 22. But at the moment there are no certainties: the scenario could be clearer by the end of this Monday, August 18.
Yesterday, a variety of signals were emerging. What Steve Witkoff, the US envoy for Ukraine, told CNN stands out: in his August face-to-face meeting with Trump, Putin allegedly agreed that the United States and European countries would provide Ukraine with security guarantees similar to those envisaged in NATO's Article 5. Witkoff commented:"This is the first time we've heard the Russians agree to something like this."
But on this other side of the Atlantic, trust in Moscow remains very low. Yesterday, Macron, Merz, and Starmer convened a videoconference meeting of the Coalition of the Willing, which brings together around thirty countries supporting Ukraine. The session lasted two hours. At the end, the French president issued a very harsh statement: Putin's demands are unacceptable; they undermine Ukraine's territorial integrity. The Russian president doesn't want peace, but Ukraine's surrender. But if we are weak towards Russia now, we are preparing for tomorrow's conflicts. We must maintain high pressure on the Kremlin. Macron says Trump wants peace, but at today's meeting in Washington, it will be necessary to ask him for clarification on security guarantees and to what extent the United States is willing to support Ukraine.
Only about half of the videoconference participants spoke. Although in different tones, they all insisted on the cohesion of the Western front and, echoing Macron's speech, on pressure on Russia. Polish Deputy Prime Minister Radoslaw Sikorski wrote on the X platform: In the videoconference, I emphasized that to achieve peace, it is necessary to exert pressure on the aggressor, not on the victim of aggression. Finnish President Stubb, also on X, commented: There is a strong consensus among the Coalition countries on the need to continue supporting Ukraine. Europe and the United States are further strengthening their common position.
Zelensky and von der Leyen also joined the conversation. The Ukrainian leader was in Brussels, where he spent much of the morning meeting with the head of the European Commission. In a joint press conference, Zelensky, among other things, noted that Moscow had not signaled any openness to a trilateral summit (with the United States and Ukraine, ed.). If Russia refuses, the Ukrainian president added, new sanctions must follow. Von der Leyen responded: We Europeans have already adopted 18 sanctions packages and are preparing the 19th, which will be launched in September. We know that the sanctions are effective. The Commission president also touched on the issue of military guarantees for Ukraine: It must become a steel hedgehog, indigestible to potential invaders.
