WATCH: Ukraine's ambassador to the EU joins us live
Highlighting today's live show is an exclusive interview with the head of the Mission of Ukraine to the EU, Chentsov Vselovod, who'll be be joining Euronews' Meabh McMahon in the studio in Brussels.
Leaders will today will be chewing over an 18th package of sanctions against Russia – resisted by Hungary and Slovakia – and Ukraine's EU accession path, following the European Commission call for Ukraine to proceed onto the next step in its bid.
Also set to cause a stir will be the leaders discussions of the EU partnership with Israel, which has been up for review in light of responses to the crack down in Gaza.
The evergreen controversial issue of migration is also up for debate.
Our on the ground reporters also bring you up to speed with the latest ahead of the summit. And Euronews presenter Meabh will preside over a live debate in studio as Belgian MEP from The Left, Marc Botenga, Austria's Lukas Mandl, of the European People's Party, face off over the key issues at stake today.
Watch live from 8am here.
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Yahoo
23 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Ukraine needs long-term security guarantees, Taoiseach says
International borders must not be changed by force, the Taoiseach has said, ahead of a meeting between the presidents of the United States and Ukraine. Micheal Martin attended a virtual leaders' meeting of the so-called 'coalition of the willing' in support of Ukraine on Sunday. The call was convened by Sir Keir Starmer, French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Friedrich Merz. On Monday, Volodymyr Zelensky is meeting Donald Trump with several EU leaders, including Sir Keir, also travelling to Washington DC in a show of solidarity with the Ukrainian president. Mr Martin, who will not be in Washington, said he had assured Mr Zelensky on Sunday that Ireland will 'continue to steadfastly support Ukraine'. EU leaders have agreed that sanctions and wider economic measures 'will be reinforced' if Russia continues its military action. The Taoiseach also said that he believes Ukraine needs 'long-term security guarantees'. Speaking after Sunday's online conference, Mr Martin said: 'I welcomed the opportunity to join other European leaders today to discuss developments on ending the war in Ukraine. 'We had a very useful engagement with President Zelensky as he prepares to meet with President Trump tomorrow in Washington. 'I welcome the initiative by President Trump to seek the ending of the Russian war of aggression against Ukraine. Ireland, together with our European partners, continues to contribute to these efforts to achieve a just and lasting peace for Ukraine.' The meeting of European leaders follows the US president's summit with Russian leader Vladimir Putin in Alaska on Friday. Mr Martin said it is 'essential that Ukraine is a full participant' in any discussions regarding its future. He said: 'I therefore welcome that President Zelensky will meet with President Trump in Washington tomorrow, together with other European leaders. Mr Martin said he stressed that international law and principles of independence, sovereignty and territorial integrity need to be respected for security in the region. 'It will be up to Ukraine to make decisions on its territory. International borders must not be changed by force. 'I fully agree that Ukraine needs strong, credible, long-term security guarantees. This will mean sustained support from Europe, the United States and other partners. 'Ireland stands ready to play our part. Earlier this year we committed to providing non-lethal military support to Ukraine and we will look to do more. 'At today's meeting, I also reiterated Ireland's readiness to contribute to any peacekeeping force that is in line with the UN Charter.' The Taoiseach said Ireland will also continue to support Ukraine's EU membership ambitions, adding that Russia 'cannot have a veto' on the matter. 'Our joint efforts for peace should be combined with firm and co-ordinated pressure on Russia to agree to a ceasefire and engage seriously with negotiations on a just and lasting peace. 'We agreed today that sanctions and wider economic measures will be reinforced if Russia does not stop the killing. 'The human dimension and accountability must also be at the centre of a just and lasting peace for Ukraine. 'Russia must urgently return Ukrainian children who they have abducted as well as prisoners of war and civilians being held unlawfully.'
Boston Globe
an hour ago
- Boston Globe
Putin agreed to let US and Europe protect Ukraine, official says
Advertisement Witkoff, who had joined Secretary of State Marco Rubio for the talks Friday at a military base in Alaska, offered few details on how such an agreement would work. But it appeared to be a major shift for Putin and could serve as a workaround to his long-standing objection to Ukraine's potential NATO membership. Get Starting Point A guide through the most important stories of the morning, delivered Monday through Friday. Enter Email Sign Up Outlining some of the details about the private discussions, Witkoff also said Russia had agreed to enact a law that it would not 'go after any other European countries and violate their sovereignty. And there was plenty more.' European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, speaking at a news conference in Brussels with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, applauded the move. 'We welcome President Trump's willingness to contribute to Article 5-like security guarantees for Ukraine and the 'Coalition of the willing' -- including the European Union -- is ready to do its share,' she said. Advertisement Zelensky thanked the United States for recent signals that Washington was willing to support such guarantees, but that much was unclear. 'It is important that America agrees to work with Europe to provide security guarantees for Ukraine,' he said, 'But there are no details how it will work, and what America's role will be, Europe's role will be and what the EU can do, and this is our main task, we need security to work in practice like Article 5 of NATO, and we consider EU accession to be part of the security guarantees,' he said. Witkoff defended Trump's decision to abandon his push that Russian agree to an immediate ceasefire, which Trump had set as a benchmark going into the meeting. Witkoff said the Republican president had pivoted toward a peace deal because so much progress was made. 'We covered almost all the other issues necessary for a peace deal,' Witkoff said, without elaborating. 'We began to see some moderation in the way they're thinking about getting to a final peace deal.' Rubio, who appeared on three Sunday news shows, said there was not going to be any kind of truce reached because Ukraine was not at the summit. 'Now, ultimately, if there isn't a peace agreement, if there isn't an end of this war, the president's been clear, there are going to be consequences,' Rubio said on ABC's 'This Week.' 'But we're trying to avoid that.' Secretary of State Marco Rubio spoke with Russia's Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov at the Friday summit. Julia Demaree Nikhinson/Associated Press Rubio, who is also Trump's national security adviser, said he did not believe imposing new U.S. sanctions on Russia would force Putin to accept a ceasefire. Advertisement 'The minute you issue new sanctions, your ability to get them to the table, our ability to get them to table will be severely diminished,' Rubio told NBC's 'Meet the Press.' He also said 'we're not at the precipice of a peace agreement' and that getting there would not be easy and would take a lot of work. 'We made progress in the sense that we identified potential areas of agreement, but there remains some big areas of disagreement. So we're still a long ways off,' Rubio said. French President Emmanuel Macron was in a video conference with European Commission Ursula van der Leyen and Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky on Sunday, Aug. 17. Philippe Magoni/Associated Press Zelensky and Europeans leaders, who heard from Trump after the summit, are scheduled to meet with him at the White House on Monday. 'I think everybody agreed that we had made progress. Maybe not enough for a peace deal, but we are on the path for the first time,' Witkoff said. He added: 'The fundamental issue, which is some sort of land swap, which is obviously ultimately in the control of the Ukrainians -- that could not have been discussed at this meeting' with Putin. 'We intend to discuss it on Monday. Hopefully we have some clarity on it and hopefully that ends up in a peace deal very, very soon.' Associated Press writers John Leicester in Le Pecq, France, and Samya Kullab in Kyiv, Ukraine, contributed to this report.
New York Post
2 hours ago
- New York Post
Putin agreed to NATO-style US security guarantees for Ukraine at Alaska summit, Witkoff says
Russian leader Vladimir Putin agreed to having the US and Europe provide Ukraine with NATO-style security guarantees as part of deal to end the war, President Trump's special envoy Steve Witkoff said Sunday. 'We were able to win the following concession: That the United States could offer Article 5-like protection, which is one of the real reasons why Ukraine wants to be in NATO,' he said on CNN's 'State of the Union.' The compromised, which emerged from Trump's Alaska summit with the Russian strongman, 'was the first time we had ever heard the Russians agree to that,' he said. Advertisement 3 Special envoy Steve Witkoff explained that President Trump and Russian leader Vladimir Putin addressed many of the key sticking points outside of territorial concerns. CNN The arrangement Witkoff laid out would involve countries, including European allies and the US, agreeing to defend Ukraine if it is attacked in the future. NATO's Article 5 stipulates that an attack on one member should be treated as an attack on all — resulting in a collective defense. Advertisement One of Putin's longtime grievances cited in the invasion of Ukraine was the country's ambition of joining the EU and NATO to defend itself from Russian attacks. A security guarantee to guard against future Russian attacks appears to be a key piece of the peace deal that Trump is pursuing. However, Putin suggested China — a Kremlin ally — could be one of the security guarantors, Axios reported. 'Putin has said that a red flag is NATO admission,' he added. 'We were discussing was assuming that that held, assuming that the Ukrainians could agree to that, and could live with.' Advertisement 3 President Trump met with Russian leader Vladimir Putin on Friday in Alaska. REUTERS Back in 1994, Russia, the US, the UK and others agreed to the 'Budapest Memorandum' with Ukraine, making security guarantees in exchange for Kyiv giving up its Soviet nuclear weapons. Witkoff also defended Trump's apparent pivot away from pursuing a ceasefire in Ukraine, arguing that a full-fledged peace deal would end the war 'quicker.' The special envoy, who sat in on Trump's meeting with Putin on Friday, contended that the details that would need to be negotiated for a ceasefire are very similar to the ones that would have to be hashed out for a peace deal. Advertisement 'We made so much progress at this meeting with regard to all the other ingredients necessary for a peace deal that President Trump pivoted to that,' Witkoff said 'We are intent on trying to hammer out a peace deal that ends the fighting permanently, very, very quickly. Quicker than a ceasefire.' When pressed by CNN anchor Jake Tapper about whether a peace deal can actually be negotiated faster than a cease-fire, Witkoff argued that 'the thesis of a ceasefire is that you'd be discussing all of these issues that we resolved in Alaska.' 'We cut through all kinds of issues that would be that would have to be discussed and agreed to during a cease-fire period,' he said. Ahead of his face-to-face with Putin, Trump told Fox News that he 'won't be happy' if Putin didn't agree to a cease-fire. Despite Putin failing to agree to a ceasefire, Trump left the meeting touting significant 'progress,' without delving into specifics. 3 Steve Witkoff has been President Trump's top emissary to Vladimir Putin. AFP via Getty Images Witkoff, whose meeting with Putin earlier this month led to the summit with Trump in Alaska on Friday, stressed that 'the Russians made some concessions at the table with regard to all five' of the disputed so-called oblast territories. Advertisement But he declined to specify what concessions Russia made. Notably, Ukraine considers Crimea to be a disputed oblast. Putin made clear that Russians wanted Ukraine to turn over the rest of the minerals-rich Donetsk, a historically Russian-speaking region, The Post previously reported. The Russians have an estimated three-quarters of Donetsk, which has been described as a 'fortress belt,' but have struggled to push further amid heavy fortifications from Ukraine. In exchange for Ukraine ceding all of Donetsk — including the parts it still controls — Russia offered to freeze its battle lines in Kherson and Zaporizhzhia, where it has made very little progress over recent months, Axios reported. Advertisement Experts fear that if Kyiv turns over Donetsk and its critical defensive lines there, the Russians could later cut deeper into Ukraine in the future. Witkoff declined to confirm whether that was the actually deal Putin offered Trump during their meeting in Alaska, and he stressed that the US president can't make territorial concessions on Ukraine's behalf. 'We were there as a mediator, so we were obviously advancing the Ukrainian view. The one thing that the president cannot agree to on behalf of the Ukrainians is any sort of land swap,' Witkoff said. 'That is for the Ukrainians … the President is respectful of it,' he added. 'That being said, we covered almost all the other issues necessary for a peace deal.' Advertisement Trump publicly said that there was a big issue that didn't get resolved, but didn't specify what it was. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is set to meet with Trump in the White House on Monday.
