PARIS (Reuters) – Ukraine’s allies should not prejudge how the next U.S administration will handle the Ukraine conflict, France’s foreign minister said on Monday, adding that Paris believed Western powers must stay united in their support for Kyiv.
U.S. President-elect Donald Trump, who has repeatedly criticised the scale of Western financial and military aid to Kyiv, spoke in recent days with Russian President Vladimir Putin and advised him not to escalate the Ukraine war, a source familiar with the conversation told Reuters on Sunday.
The Kremlin denied on Monday that Putin and Trump had spoken.
“Facing the speculation on what could be the positions or initiatives of the new U.S administration, I think that we absolutely should not prejudge and we have to give it (the administration) time,” Jean-Noel Barrot told the Paris Peace Forum.
However, Barrot said any initiatives would have to ensure that Ukraine itself determined the timing and conditions for engaging in a negotiation process. In the meantime, he said, Western allies had to give Kyiv all the necessary means to push back invading Russian forces.
“Ukraine, and beyond that the international community, would have too much to lose if Russia imposed the law of the strongest,” he said.
France’s defence minister said on Sunday that Paris was sending a new batch of long-range missiles to Ukraine so it could strike behind Russian lines.
“President Volodymr Zelenskiy has met President- elect Donald Trump numerous times and I don’t doubt that a strong relationship will be established with the new administration…,” said Barrot.
Finland’s Foreign Minister Elina Valtonen told the same forum it was time Ukraine’s allies sharpened their analysis on Russia
“It’s not only about Ukraine. The threat that Russia is causing for humankind is existential and does not start or end with Ukraine” said Valtonen, whose country joined NATO last year in response to Russia’s Feb. 2022 invasion of Ukraine.
(Reporting by John Irish; Editing by Gareth Jones)
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