00:00But first, Ukraine's president is in Paris today.
00:14Vladimir Zelensky in the French capital for the latest edition of the Coalition of the Willing Summit,
00:19co-hosted by the French president and the British prime minister.
00:23The meeting comes after Donald Trump's deadline for Vladimir Putin to meet Ukraine's president came and went.
00:30Kiev is expecting security guarantees from its allies here in Europe as the war drags on and Russia's advances on the battlefield continue.
00:39James of Sina reports.
00:42Back in Paris and back to the conference table.
00:46Leaders from across Europe are set to join Vladimir Zelensky and Emmanuel Macron either in person or by video call in Paris this Thursday.
00:55That will be the case for Donald Trump.
00:59He'll be phoning in from the United States and the matter at hand will be to determine what security guarantees these countries are prepared to provide to Ukraine.
01:08Should the war come to an end after a peace treaty is signed with Russia?
01:12We expect tomorrow or soon after tomorrow to have clarity on what collectively we can deliver.
01:20If a bilateral or trilateral meeting would start to happen with the Russians, particularly between Zelensky and Putin,
01:29clearly having clarity on the security guarantees is extremely important.
01:34For now, the details of these guarantees are extremely confidential, according to the French president.
01:42And for Ukraine, clear wording will be key as it seeks to avoid past mistakes, like the 1994 Budapest memorandum, which failed to protect the country's sovereignty.
01:52Ukraine, unfortunately, has this very bitter experience, very bitter past when it comes to security guarantees and negotiations on that and documents proving them.
02:03Ukraine needs real security guarantees, which are robust, which are really effective, which are working, which are not assurances.
02:11They are real security guarantees.
02:15And obviously we don't need Budapest number two.
02:18The Budapest memorandum was meant to see Russia respect Ukraine's border in exchange for its nuclear disarmament
02:26and was signed by the United States and the United Kingdom.
02:31Speaking in China on Wednesday, Vladimir Putin suggested a meeting with Zelensky in Moscow.
02:36But Kyiv called this an unacceptable proposal.
02:39We can now bring in John Lau, head of foreign policy at the new Eurasian Strategies Center.
02:50Good afternoon and thank you for joining us on the program today.
02:53Are the Americans now on the same page as the Europeans when it comes to how to bring this war to an end,
02:59given that Donald Trump's new deadline for Vladimir Putin to meet with Vladimir Zelensky has essentially come and gone?
03:06Well, to some extent they are, because I think President Trump is realizing that President Putin isn't willing to play his game,
03:17that he has no interest in bringing this war to an end anytime soon, because he believes he can win the war.
03:25So he's been going through the motions of suggesting that peace talks are possible.
03:30But when he talks about peace, what he really means is the subjugation of Ukraine,
03:35because for him, a peace settlement will come about when Ukraine is defeated or when it's about to recognize that it will be defeated.
03:41So to that extent, I think that there's a sobering up on the U.S. side,
03:47a realization that what they believe they were told by the Russians was not, in fact, true.
03:53And we're sort of back to square one.
03:56So the Europeans have been skeptical all the time about what Putin is saying and his commitment to any sort of peace process.
04:02So they're rightly trying to put in place some sort of structure that when we get to that point,
04:08when peace talks take place, that Putin realizes that, in fact, Ukraine still has very considerable support
04:16and that he's not going to be able to, for example, simply to demilitarize Ukraine
04:21and to deprive it of its sovereignty and independence.
04:25So in some ways, the Europeans are getting a little bit ahead of themselves here
04:29in talking about, you know, how things might look on the ground after the signing of a peace agreement.
04:35Because that is what I'm going to ask you, are the Europeans essentially going ahead
04:38and putting the cart before the horse, given that we haven't brought this war to a close,
04:44yet they're thinking about the day after.
04:45Should they not be putting more eggs in the diplomatic basket in terms of bringing this war to an end?
04:51Well, it depends what you mean by the diplomatic basket.
04:56I mean, fly to Moscow and talk to Vladimir Putin because they tried to go to Washington
05:02to reach the US, to reach the Russian president, but that's in the other direction, effectively.
05:08If you look at it this way, if the US president can't achieve a result with the Russians,
05:12then the Europeans certainly can't.
05:14The most important thing they can do at the moment is to bolster Ukraine's defenses,
05:19in particular its air defenses, because the country is coming under increasing attack.
05:24We're seeing numbers of civilians losing their lives, a big attack on Kiev last week,
05:2925 people killed, an attack on Odessa last night.
05:33These attacks are increasing, despite the fact that Putin has been in talks with Trump
05:39about, you know, some sort of potential peace arrangement.
05:42So at the moment, I think you're absolutely right.
05:45The Europeans, to some extent, are getting ahead of themselves because if they are to get
05:50to the sort of peace deal that they envisage, Ukraine has to keep fighting and it has to
05:55be supported in that process.
05:57Let's talk about the security guarantees because we still, the details are scant.
06:01But if, for instance, that the Europeans announce some sort of boots on the ground type situation
06:08in Ukraine, this is not going to be palatable for the Russians.
06:12And again, we're back to square one.
06:15Yeah, the boots on the ground, in my view, at the moment, are a fantasy because the Russians
06:20have made this plane from the very outset that they would never accept this.
06:24So the only way they could be made to accept this would be for them to accept that they can't
06:29defeat Ukraine, that the cost of fighting the war is greater than they would like.
06:37And that they should be then persuaded to stop as soon as possible.
06:41But we're very far from that point.
06:44And Putin has invested so much effort in this war that I believe he feels he has a chance
06:48to win it and he's determined to win it.
06:51I want to ask you something else because the U.S. has poured cold water over the notion of
06:56Ukraine joining NATO.
06:57Yet we have NATO Secretary General.
06:59We have Britain's Prime Minister.
07:01Even the EU Commission President, who sort of keeps talking about Ukraine someday joining
07:09NATO or its place being in NATO.
07:11If European leaders all decide to take this off the table, could we not potentially go ahead
07:18and actually achieve peace and bring this war to an end, which continues to this day?
07:24As you said, Russia continues to bombard and is gaining ground on the battlefield.
07:30Yeah, you're absolutely right.
07:32The Russians are advancing, but they know full well that there is no chance of Ukraine joining
07:37NATO anytime soon.
07:39The fact that President Trump seems to agree with them that there's no need for Ukraine to
07:44join NATO is very significant.
07:46NATO is a consensus organization.
07:48And without its biggest contributor, the United States, there is, of course, absolutely no way
07:54that this is going to get over the line.
07:56So the Russians know that full well.
07:58What was interesting in Putin's remarks from Beijing yesterday was that he seemed to indicate
08:06that Russia now has no objections to Ukraine joining the European Union.
08:10Now, that certainly wasn't the case in 2014.
08:13And in fact, was the trigger for the annexation of Crimea.
08:16So to what extent the position has really changed there is unclear whether Putin really means
08:22this, of course, is another thing because he is regularly untruthful when it comes to the
08:29issue of Ukraine.
08:30So we just have to see how the Russian position develops over the coming weeks and months if
08:39Ukraine can stay in the fight.
08:41Putin seems to believe that Ukraine can be defeated rapidly.
08:44There were some reports that the Americans were growing frustrated with the Europeans because
08:50the Americans felt that the Europeans were not being helpful in a diplomatic solution or
08:56trying to bring this war to an end based on just the rhetoric coming out of Europe.
09:02What do you think of that?
09:03Well, I can understand that there are probably some people in the United States who just want
09:10to see a quick end to this war at any cost, who would see that the Europeans are being
09:15difficult, that the United States has spent a vast amount of money on this war and, in
09:21their view, to no great effect and could have done better things with it.
09:25But I would say at the same time, in Congress, in Washington, there is still strong support
09:31for Ukraine.
09:32Within the Republican Party, I believe still there is significant commitment to the need
09:39to support Ukraine for the security of Europe because the security of Europe affects the United
09:44States.
09:45So I don't believe that President Trump is going to sell Ukraine down the river, but
09:52I can understand that he wants to see rapid progress.
09:56And he's done everything possible to suggest to Putin that this is the time to settle.
10:02I'm not going to use any hard instruments against you.
10:04I'm not going to impose sanctions.
10:06I'm doing everything possible to make it easy for you to agree to some sort of peace deal.
10:12But despite having said that to Putin, Putin hasn't really taken him up yet on the offer.
10:20So that suggests to me that Putin feels that he can still get much more out of this war.
10:24And that is simply by forcing the Ukrainians and the European allies to recognize there
10:28is no alternative to this Russian version of peace in Ukraine.
10:34John, we're going to have to leave it there.
10:35Thank you for joining us on the program today.
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