French President Emmanuel Macron has said a truce between Ukraine and Russia could be agreed in the coming weeks.
He was speaking to Fox News in Washington following talks with Donald Trump at the White House on the third anniversary of Russia’s invasion.
The US president, who suggested the war could end “within weeks”, insisted Europe should shoulder the cost and burden of any peacekeeping deal for Ukraine.
Macron said any peace deal in Ukraine must “not be a surrender of Ukraine” and must be backed by security guarantees.
On Monday evening, during a press conference with his American counterpart Donald Trump, Macron said that France aims to reach a “swift agreement” on Ukraine, with “security guarantees” for Kiev, which could include sending military personnel to Ukraine.
“Not to go to the front line, not to go in confrontation, but to be in some locations, being defined by the treaty, as a presence to maintain this peace and our collective credibility with the US backup,” Macron said.
Macron also noted that “Europe has allocated $138 billion in aid to Ukraine,” emphasizing that the European Union shares Washington’s desire to end the conflict quickly but insists that any peace agreement must include security guarantees for Kiev.
“In the past, we discussed the possibility of sending troops in the context of war to create strategic uncertainty. Now, we are talking about the future after a peace agreement, once peace between Russia and Ukraine is signed, which we will guarantee.”
The French president pointed out that “Europe has realized it must ensure its own security,” and according to him, Europe is “ready to do more” in the future.
Earlier, Russian President Vladimir Putin stated that the goal of ending the conflict in Ukraine should not be merely a short-term ceasefire or a break to regroup and rearm forces in order to continue the conflict later, but rather a long-term peace.
Earlier, the press office of the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service mentioned that the West intends to deploy what is called a “peacekeeping force,” which would include about 100,000 people in Ukraine, to restore the combat readiness of Kiev’s system. Russian foreign intelligence believes this would amount to an actual occupation of Ukraine.
Russian Presidential Spokesman Dmitry Peskov confirmed that the deployment of “peacekeeping forces” would only be possible with the consent of the parties involved in the conflict and stated that it is too early to discuss peacekeeping forces in Ukraine.
