NATO defense chiefs hold ‘candid discussion’ on security guarantees for Ukraine

BRUSSELS (AP) — NATO defense chiefs held a “candid discussion” Wednesday about what security guarantees they could offer Kyiv to help forge a peace agreement that ends Russia’s three-year war on Ukraine, a senior alliance official said.

Italian Admiral Giuseppe Cavo Dragone, the chair of NATO’s Military Committee, said that 32 defense chiefs from across the alliance held a video conference amid a U.S.-led diplomatic push to end the fighting.

He said there was a “great, candid discussion” in the call. “I thanked everyone for their always proactive participation in these meetings: we are united, and that unity was truly tangible today, as always,” he wrote on social platform X without providing further details.

Assurances that it won’t be invaded again in the future are one of the keys for getting Ukraine to sign up for a peace deal with Russia. It wants Western help for its military, including weapons and training, to shore up its defenses, and Western officials are scrambling to figure out what commitments they might offer.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov chided efforts to work on security arrangements in Ukraine without Moscow’s involvement.

“We cannot agree with the fact that it is now proposed to resolve collective security issues without the Russian Federation. This will not work,” Lavrov said Wednesday, according to state news agency RIA Novosti.

Russia will “ensure (its) legitimate interests firmly and harshly,” Lavrov added at a news conference in Moscow with Jordanian Foreign Minister Ayman al-Safadi.

U.S. Gen. Alexus Grynkewich, NATO’s supreme allied commander Europe, took part in the virtual talks, Dragone said. U.S. Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, was also due to participate, a U.S. defense official said.

Caine also met with European military chiefs Tuesday evening in Washington to assess the best military options for political leaders, according to the defense official, who wasn’t authorized to comment publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity.

Defense chiefs work on details of a Ukraine security force

U.S. President Donald Trump met last Friday with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Alaska and on Monday hosted Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and prominent European leaders at the White House. Neither meeting delivered concrete progress.

Trump is trying to steer Putin and Zelenskyy toward a settlement more than three years after Russia invaded its neighbor, but there are major obstacles. They include Ukraine’s demands for Western-backed military assurances to ensure Russia won’t mount another invasion in the coming years.

“We need strong security guarantees to ensure a truly secure and lasting peace,” Zelenskyy said in a Telegram post Wednesday after Russian missile and drone strikes hit six regions of Ukraine overnight.

Kyiv’s European allies are looking to set up a force that could backstop any peace agreement, and a coalition of 30 countries, including European nations, Japan and Australia, has signed up to support the initiative.

Military chiefs are figuring out how that security force might work. The role that the U.S. might play is unclear. Trump on Tuesday ruled out sending U.S. troops to help defend Ukraine against Russia.

Russia has repeatedly said that it would not accept NATO troops in Ukraine.

Attacks on civilian areas in Sumy and Odesa overnight into Wednesday injured 15 people, including a family with three small children, Ukrainian authorities said. Russian strikes also targeted ports and fuel and energy infrastructure, officials said.

Zelenskyy said the strikes “only confirm the need for pressure on Moscow, the need to introduce new sanctions and tariffs until diplomacy works to its full potential.”

Switzerland could host a Putin-Zelenskyy summit

Trump said Monday he has begun arrangements for a face-to-face meeting between Putin and Zelenskyy, although the Kremlin hasn’t publicly confirmed such a possibility and no venue was suggested.

Lavrov, in his Moscow press conference, said Russia is prepared to continue negotiations with Ukraine in any format.

He said Putin proposed to Trump raising the level of representation in delegations that recently took part in largely fruitless direct talks in Istanbul. He added that “a separate block (of talks) should be devoted to examining the political aspects of the settlement, along with the military and humanitarian ones.”

Ukraine and Western leaders have accused Putin of dragging out peace negotiations in the hope of capturing more land before any settlement.

French President Emmanuel Macron has said the summit could happen in Europe and proposed the Swiss city of Geneva. Switzerland has expressed its willingness to act as host.

Putin’s ability to travel abroad is limited because he is wanted by the International Criminal Court in The Hague on a warrant dating back to March 2023 for alleged involvement in the abduction of Ukrainian children. More than 100 countries are ICC signatories and have a legal obligation to arrest the Russian leader on their soil.

Switzerland intends to ask the ICC to exempt it from sanctions in order to allow Putin in for a summit, according to a senior official in The Hague with direct knowledge of the request. The official was not authorized to speak about the proceedings and spoke on condition of anonymity.

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Novikov reported from Kyiv, Ukraine. Molly Quell contributed from The Hague and Mike Pesoli from Washington.

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Follow AP’s coverage of the war in Ukraine at https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine