Fire Sale

European leaders and Ukrainian officials reacted with alarm over the weekend and agreed to an emergency meeting Monday after the United States announced that Europe would be excluded from upcoming peace negotiations aimed at ending the war in Ukraine, with talks expected this week in Saudi Arabia between the US and Russia, Al Jazeera reported.

During the Munich Security Conference in Germany over the weekend, the US special envoy to Ukraine Keith Kellogg confirmed that European nations would not be included in the negotiations, telling conference participants that “the answer to that last question, just as you framed it, is no,” when asked if Europe and Ukraine would have a seat at the table.

While Kellogg claimed that Ukraine would be involved in negotiations, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy later countered that Ukraine had not received an invitation to the upcoming meeting in Saudi Arabia.

Kellogg’s announcement came days after a phone call between US President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin last week, where they discussed starting talks to end the war.

The diplomat’s comments prompted swift backlash from Zelenskyy and other European officials.

Finnish President Alexander Stubb insisted that discussions on Kyiv’s future must include Europe and Ukraine while calling on the continent to “talk less and do more.”

European leaders from the UK, France, Germany, Italy, Poland, Spain and Denmark, the EU Council, and NATO are meeting in Paris Monday after French President Emmanuel Macron convened an emergency meeting to coordinate a response, the BBC reported.

NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte urged European nations to “get into the debate” by increasing defense spending and presenting concrete security proposals, rather than merely protesting their exclusion.

Meanwhile, Zelenskyy called for the creation of a European army, stating that Europe could no longer rely on the US for protection.

Observers said the decision to move forward without Europe follows the Trump administration’s repeated calls for European allies to take greater responsibility for security in the region, with Washington shifting its focus to border security and countering China, the BBC added.

Concerns over US concessions to Russia were also fueled by recent remarks from US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, who said that Ukraine’s return to its pre-2014 borders was “unrealistic” and that NATO membership for Ukraine was off the table.

European leaders have privately expressed fears that Washington may be preparing to pressure Ukraine into territorial concessions before formal peace talks even begin.

Also, tensions are growing between the US and Ukraine over a proposed deal granting the US ownership of 50 percent of Ukraine’s mineral wealth, such as rare earth minerals, NBC News wrote.

On Saturday, the Ukrainian president said he had declined to sign a draft contract with the US giving away the nation’s minerals, saying it lacked “security guarantees” for Kyiv and did not adequately protect Ukrainian interests, adding that “these resources belong to our people.”