Moscow rejects Trump claim that it would accept European peacekeepers in Ukraine

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has accused the UK and France of further fueling the war in Ukraine by proposing a European peacekeeping force be deployed to the country to ensure that the terms of a peace deal were observed, state-owned news agency RIA Novosti reported on Wednesday.

Speaking at a press conference in Qatar, Lavrov said that Europe’s approach to the conflict was to escalate, rather than de-escalate or to address its root causes, adding that the peacekeeping proposals made by London and Paris merely “aimed to pump Ukraine full of weapons”, draw Ukraine closer to NATO and infringe on the rights of the country’s Russian-speakers.

Lavrov also denied European claims that Russia had been unwilling to negotiate over Ukraine, adding that Russia had repeatedly offered to hold talks on bringing about an end to the war. He also confirmed that there would be a meeting between the US and Russia in Istanbul on Thursday to discuss the normalisation of diplomatic relations, RIA Novosti reported.

Moscow’s clarification of its stance on the presence of European troops in Ukraine came after US President Donald Trump claimed on Monday to have discussed the matter with Vladimir Putin. “He will accept them,” Trump told journalists during a visit to Washington by French President Emmanuel Macron, adding: “I specifically asked him that question — he has no problem with it.”

Meanwhile, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said that he had nothing to add to Lavrov’s comments, but stressed that it was still premature to talk about the deployment of peacekeepers to Ukraine, according to state-affiliated business news outlet RBC.