BRUSSELS - Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy held talks with NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte and other European leaders on Wednesday, aiming to get immediate help to bolster Kiev's war effort and discuss long-term security guarantees. .
President Zelenskiy told reporters that Wednesday's talks in Brussels, and a discussion with the 27 leaders of European Union member states the next day, were "a very good opportunity to talk about security guarantees for Ukraine for today and for tomorrow."
While European leaders insist they are focusing on Ukraine's urgent needs, some officials have begun discussing how to ensure the country's security once the fighting stops, including the possibility of deploying European forces.
Posting later on the X network, President Zelenskiy said he and Mr Rutte had an "important and very substantive meeting" focusing on "strengthening air defense for Ukraine and ensuring the credibility of the peace we are collectively working towards". .
NATO "will do everything to ensure that Ukraine is as strong as possible when we return to more active diplomacy," he said.
Wednesday's talks with Ukraine were over battlefield defenses and uncertainty over future support from the United States, as President-elect Donald Trump sought a quick end to the war and called for an immediate ceasefire.
Mr Rutte said the talks would focus on taking measures to put Ukraine "in the best possible position" whenever it decides to enter peace talks, by supplying it with more air defense systems and other weapons. to support Kiev's war against the Russian occupation forces.
Mr Rutte and Mr Zelenskiy were later joined by a group of other European leaders.
NATO did not say who would participate in these talks. But diplomats said the talks would include German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, Polish President Andrzej Duda, the foreign ministers of France and Britain, as well as senior EU officials Ursula von der Leyen and Antonio Costa.
Earlier, Ukrainian President Zelenskiy met with French President Emmanuel Macron, who has supported the discussion of the idea of European forces for Ukraine.
"We share a common vision: credible guarantees are essential for a truly achievable peace," Mr Zelenskiy posted on the X network after the meeting.
"We continued to work on President Macron's initiative regarding the presence of forces in Ukraine that could contribute to stabilizing the path to peace."
Asked how Britain would respond if President Zelenskiy asked to send British troops to Ukraine, British Foreign Secretary David Lammy told Sky News he saw no sign Russian President Vladimir Putin was willing to negotiate.
"The discussion is about supplying Ukraine for the coming days. That is why we are meeting at this very bleak moment, to make sure that Ukraine will get through the winter and enter 2025," he said.
"I know there is a lot of speculation, but the truth is that Putin is not a man to negotiate with when he is causing such chaos on European soil at this moment in time," he added. "It is the force that Vladimir Putin will react to"./VOA (A2 Televizion)
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