Europe wary of Trump administration’s talk of broader security agreement with Russia

European leaders are less than confident in President Donald Trump’s undefined plan to pursue a broad security agreement between the continent, Ukraine, and Russia.Russian President Vladimir Putin’s envoy, Kirill Dmitriev, met with Trump at the White House on Thursday while attending a joint event with Ukrainian leaders to celebrate the successful Oleshky ceasefire and evacuation operation. Trump announced a framework that is “going to involve more than Ukraine” and “might involve all of Europe.”The president’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, who has been involved in the negotiations, said on Friday that the president had discussed with several European leaders the need for “a broader European security architecture that can help establish the conditions for lasting peace.” But those vague plans do not seem to inspire much enthusiasm across the Atlantic, where officials are weary of a deal materializing without their input. European Union foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas denied interest in Trump’s plan, bluntly telling reporters in Warsaw on Friday that “we already have a European security architecture in place.”“The problem remains that Russia keeps breaking the treaties that underpin it,” she said. “NATO posed no threat to Russia in 2021, and it poses no threat to Russia at the moment. Putin does not have a veto over European security.”A spokeswoman for the European Commission referenced the “statements made by President Trump” at a press conference in Brussels on Friday, reiterating doubts about the efficacy of making security deals with their most prominent military threat.“We very well know that Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine is a threat to Europe’s security and challenges the international rules-based order itself,” she told reporters, emphasizing that “it’s obviously up to the European Union to decide on matters which affect its security.”Kurt Volker, the former U.S. ambassador to NATO, said a deal that Russia would agree to likely involves limitations on NATO and Ukraine’s military posture in addition to the lifting of sanctions.“We haven’t heard anything from Trump that might be serious, and it may all just be bluster. But I have a feeling what it is is Russia’s designs for a new European security architecture, with neutrality for Ukraine and limitations on NATO enlargement and military deployments, and you know, lifting of all sanctions on Russia, and etc. And I think that’s dead on arrival. I think it’s just the Russia wish list,” he told the Washington Examiner.He noted a deal that European leaders would likely approve of would include a “ceasefire in place in Ukraine, no limitations on NATO and NATO enlargement in the future, Russia agreeing to live within its borders, and we have a long-term disagreement over Russian-occupied Ukraine. Russia says it’s Russia; we say it’s not, but we just live with this disagreement.”John Herbst, a former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine, also has “very low expectations for next week’s talks,” he told the Washington Examiner.“Putin remains committed to establishing his control, his effective control, which is not to say territorial control, because the territorial aspects of Ukraine’s politics, in other words, of decision-making, especially on the national security side in Kyiv. And for that, he needs a lot more territory. So he has no intention of taking any actual steps towards a peace that’s not Ukraine’s submission to his will, and his method for achieving this is to keep up military and economic pressure on Ukraine and to undermine Western support for Ukraine,” Herbst added.UKRAINE OPTIMISTIC ABOUT POSSIBLE ADDITIONAL LOCALIZED CEASEFIRES AFTER OLESHKY WITH MELANIA TRUMP’S HELPOfficials from Russia, Ukraine, and the United States are set to meet in Abu Dhabi next week for trilateral talks focused on ending the war. The lack of progress through two years of the Trump administration in a conflict that has gone on for nearly five years does not suggest a high chance of a breakthrough.“This is a charade. Russia keeps bombing Ukrainian cities and civilians, and so Trump doesn’t want the appearance of doing nothing,” Volker added. “So they say, ‘Well, let’s have negotiations,’ but Russia has given no indication at all that it’s prepared to end the war or to negotiate an agreement or to do anything, and they won’t agree to meet with Zelensky at a high level because that would be legitimizing Ukraine as an independent state and legitimizing Zelensky. So Putin won’t do that either.”