00:00Субтитры сделал DimaTorzok
00:30So the Coalition of the Willing have met in Paris again and we know that their plans are quite far advanced in terms of the military situation in a post-conflict Ukraine.
00:39But key to that, of course, as we know, is U.S. security guarantees.
00:44And what do we know about that so far? How concrete can they be?
00:49That's a good question.
00:50And frankly speaking, when I was in Odessa last week, I discussed with my Ukrainian counterpart.
00:57And he explained to me and to my colleague coming from Luxembourg and the Netherlands because it was a Benedict's mission that U.S.
01:10and especially President Trump and Secretary Rubio made strong commitments related to this not only guarantee, but really legally based backstop.
01:26So that's something which should be normally like an Article 5, let's say, way of thinking.
01:35Of course, I till now, I didn't see any paper in order to identify whether or not it is enough strong in order to give to Ukraine like certainties.
01:50But I think that it's important also that the U.S. play an important role.
01:57But of course, Europe also have to to take responsibility.
02:03From the Trump perspective, how reliable can these security guarantees, this backstop be when we know over the past few weeks in particular,
02:12we've seen him change his mind over things like a ceasefire and look at the end of the day, it's not Article 5 because Ukraine is not in NATO.
02:19Yeah, it's really the core aspect of the current negotiation.
02:27We need to draw the framework of potential U.S. intervention, where, how, when.
02:38And it's true that when we discuss with Washington, there are several times a change of way of thinking, let's say.
02:49So it will be really important to have strong commitments on paper in order to be sure that what U.S. has mentioned will be correctly executed in the advantage of Ukraine, of course.
03:05From a Belgian perspective, in the last few weeks, we've seen the European Commission really pushing for an updated scheme to take the €200 billion of frozen assets that Russia has in Europe mainly, in particular in Belgium.
03:20And it's really sort of the momentum has grown since the recent attack in Kyiv, particularly against the European Union's offices and so on.
03:27So, is the Belgian position for moving on this?
03:30Frankly speaking, and I clearly mentioned it once again in Copenhagen last week, confiscating those Russian sovereign assets is really not an option for Belgium.
03:46And maybe changing also the strategic investment of the current assets frozen in Brussels is also not an option for Belgium.
03:59Because when we analyzed the two options, we have many experts underlying the high risk, both legal, financial risk it can generate if we decide to confiscate.
04:20Of course, it will be a very bad signal to other countries worldwide, some of them also have assets, sovereign assets in Brussels or in other places in Europe.
04:38And so, we consider that confiscating those immobilized assets should trigger the financial places, should generate some disturbance and erode also the confidence, the trust in the euro.
05:01So, it's really something that should create huge bad impact, systemic consequences for the credibility of the European financial places, according also to the European Central Bank.
05:20So, it's why I express the fact that Belgium will not take this risk and certainly not alone.
05:30Belgium has announced, you have announced as Minister of Foreign Affairs in Belgium, that Belgium will eventually recognize Palestine.
05:37First of all, the reaction to that from the Israelis for other governments since October 7th is that you're rewarding terrorism because the offshoot of October 7th is that several countries have decided to recognize Palestine.
05:51What's your response to that criticism by the Israeli government?
05:53First, the context on the ground is really inhuman, especially in Gaza, when children, women, all the people and many citizens are starving.
06:10It's completely unacceptable.
06:11And I remind to the Israeli government that cutting off any humanitarian head is a war crime.
06:21And so, seeing the fact that the Israeli government intend to launch new processes, not only for the total military occupation of Gaza,
06:34but also for the expansion of new illegal settlements, especially in West Bank, we would like to send to the Israeli government, of course,
06:49but also the whole, the whole diplomatic world, a strong political sign.
06:53But at the same time, we will consider that the moment for Belgium to officially recognize the state of Palestine will come later,
07:07when two conditions will be met in order to avoid precisely, to give the impression that we would like to reward Hamas.
07:21And so, that's the release of all the hostages, and also the fact that Hamas is out of any governance of Palestinian.
07:31That's two conditions for a formal and legal recognition of the state of Palestine for Belgium.
07:39So, let's look at what we heard from Kayakalas, the youth foreign policy chief.
07:43She said that the U.S.'s unshakable support for Israel means that Europe is a little inhibited in what it can do.
07:52But in particular, when there has been some proposals, such as the most recent one from the European Commission,
07:58to partially suspend Israeli access to Horizon, the main obstacle is Germany.
08:03Germany has refused all along to any sort of progress in sanctioning Israel for what the EU even regards as breaches of international law.
08:13Of course, I respect the sovereignty of whole government to take a decision,
08:18and I understand why Germany doesn't want to take sanctions against Israel for historical reasons, we know that.
08:29But I've also seen that Germany has decided to, for instance, take strong commitments regarding the export of weapons to Israel.
08:48So, the lines are moving, and maybe we will be able to achieve extra results.
08:58I think it is important also for the credibility of the European foreign policy.
09:05Frankly speaking, this credibility of the current foreign policy is collapsing.
09:13And it is not the fault of Kayakalas.
09:15Let me be clear, I really underline a strong involvement for leading the foreign and security policy of Europe.
09:27But for many of our citizens, it's quite difficult to understand why, especially regarding the situation in Gaza.
09:37It is impossible for the EU to take strong decision.
09:41It's, yes, they don't understand why we are not capable to take specific sanctions, seeing the different images we are looking when we open the television.
09:59One of the other things you are going to do is stop importing goods from settlements, illegal settlements in the West Bank.
10:05Slovenia has done this. Ireland is doing something similar.
10:08Norway has done something similar in relation to boycotting settlements.
10:13But the backlash has been quite severe from the United States and Israel.
10:18Those countries have been threatened with sanctions, for example.
10:21Of course, we have concerns, but frankly speaking, it's quite difficult to refuse to act according to our legal obligation when we face the current situation in Gaza only because of some fears related to economic aspects.
10:41Of course, we have the impression that the decision take is just a courageous one, but also a needed one.
10:55And I hope that the U.S. will not take, let's say, kind of sanction against the countries who decided to act like this in order to respect the international law, the humanitarian law,
11:15and trying to push pressure on Israel, not on the people of Israel, of course, because we also have, at Belgian level, taken some strong commitments in order to fight against any anti-Semitism, for instance.
11:33But it's really one of the measures taken in order to fight against the current far-right extremist government and the way this government is acting against the Palestinians.
11:49Okay, Maxime Prevost, Minister for Foreign Affairs of Belgium, thank you very much for joining us on the Europe Conversation.
11:55Thank you.
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