Europe has tightened around Volodymyr Zelensky in a compact way. Or almost. The Hungarian Viktor Orban has once again disappeared from his colleagues, but the Ukrainian leader can consider his mission to Brussels a success. Zelensky had been invited to participate in the extraordinary European Council, convened quickly and fury by President Antonio Costa to approve the plan for the rearmament of the Europe of Ursula von der Leyen and to reiterate the support to Kiev in his journey towards a “right and lasting peace” with the Russia of Vladimir Putin.
The Running to Resto
In a geopolitical context that is now completely revolutionized, with transatlantic relationships to historical minimums after the turning point imposed on the United States by Donald Trump, the European Union launched a rapper race to prepare to take charge of its safety alone, without relying on the Washington shadow. “I want to believe that the United States will be by our side. But we must be ready if it were not so,” the French president Emmanuel Macron warned in a gloomy television speech on the eve of the summit.
Thus Europe is rearmed: Von der Leyen’s plan is worth 800 billion
And EU leaders enthusiastically accepted the proposals of the European Commission to grant them tax flexibility on the spending and creation of a 150 billion euro tool to be borrowed from the EU governments for military expenditure. In a joint declaration agreed by all 27 Member States, the heads of state and government have asked to hurry. “Europe must collect this challenge, this armament race. And it must win it,” said Polish premier Donald Tusk.
Orban parades
At the end of a long day of negotiations, the heads of state and EU government also reiterated their “continuous and unshakable support for independence, sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine within its internationally recognized borders”. These are the words of the conclusions of the summit on Ukraine, which however unlike those on the defense have been signed by 26 countries, with Orban who refused to sign them. Indeed, they were “strongly supported” by 26 countries: this was the formula chosen to present them, as if to say that the opposition of Budapest matters little.
In the end, even the Slovak Robert Fico, initially skeptical, supported the text after he was promised an effort for the restoration of Russian gas flows through Ukraine.
Warm welcome
At the meeting of the European Council Zelensky was welcomed with all honors and in a very warm way. All the heads of state and government got up in turn to shake hands with his entry into the meeting room to Europe Building. Giorgia Meloni also kissed him, as well as several other premier.
On the sidelines of the meeting, the Italian premier said that the goal is “to get to a solution that can be effective and serious”, to a “right peace” that has “rules”, and has claimed that “if we had not supported Ukraine today we would not be talking about peace”. The German chancellor Olaf Scholz was more decisively, who rejected any “imposed” peace. A clear message to Trump, while Germany starts to a historic abandonment of the rules of austerity to support European rearmament.
Germany puts the helmet: “Enough austerity, we must arm yourself against Russia”
The coalition of the willing
Before the meeting, Zelensky had several bilaterals, the most important of which was the one with the French president Emmanuel Macron, in which a meeting was agreed on 11 March of the coalition of the willing, the European states ready to make available in the future of the military for a possible contingent of peace. “The analysis shared by all EU Member States is that Russia represents an existential threat for all Europeans in the long run”, Macron supported at the end of the Council.
Important discussion with president @Zelenskyyua About the path to a lasting peace in Ukraine. pic.twitter.com/0yuxept5D
– Mark Rutte (@secgenzenato) March 6, 2025
Several countries have given their availability, but among these there is no Italy. Turkey, which has the second largest number of NATO troops, also stressed that it is ready to unfold “if necessary” to make the fights cease. In Brussels Zelensky he also met the secretary general of the Atlantic alliance, Mark Rutte. The two had an “important discussion” on the “path to lasting peace in Ukraine”, wrote the Dutchman on X.
The thaw with Trump
In short, between kisses, bilaterals and high -level encounters, including one with the king of Belgium Filippo, a very different image came from Brussels from what was seen in the oval studio last week. But Kiev and Washington are working to reopen the channels of dialogue. The American correspondent for the Middle East, Steve Witkoff, announced that he will meet a Ukrainian delegation next week, to Riyadh or Jeddah, to define “a picture for a peace agreement and one ceased the initial fire”. The meeting is scheduled for Tuesday.
According to Witkoff, Trump considered that the letter drawn up by the Ukrainian head of state contained “apologies” and was “a very positive first step” to resume direct contacts. For the US president and his negotiating team, however, he remains preliminary to the whole agreement on Ukrainian minerals, who so far the leader of Kiev has refused to sign in the absence of security guarantees. Security guarantees on which the Ukrainian President has returned to insist on his speech to the European Council.
Trump government officials talk to the Ukrainian opposition after the clash with Zelensky
But at the moment there are no guarantees that Zelensky remains in his place. According to the political information site, four representatives of Trump’s entourage of Trump would have had secret interviews with some of his main opponents in Kiev, in particular with the leader of the opposition and former Ukrainian premier Yulia Tymoshenko and with high level members of the Petro Poroshenko party, Zelensky’s predecessor. The US president wants Ukraine elections, in the belief that Zelensky, the “dictator”, will lose and leave the scene. Which Putin would also like.
