US defence secretary Pete Hegseth is set to meet dozens of his counterparts at a Nato meeting in Brussels, a day after the US president, Donald Trump, said he had spoken to Russia’s Vladimir Putin about negotiating an end to the war.
But the development came just hours after Hegseth told an international meeting of Ukraine’s backers on Wednesday not only that Kyiv could not realistically hope to return to previous borders or join Nato – a sign of things to come from Trump later – but also that the US was no longer “primarily focused” on European security.
“That is why president Trump has called for increased defence spending across the board for Nato, for European countries to recognise this is an urgent, real threat to the continent and this aggression needs to be a wake up call,” he said.
When asked if any European countries would be involved in peace talks, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said: “I don’t have any European nations who are involved currently to read out for you.”.
We heard a lot of statements from European countries overnight insisting that no decisions can be made without Ukraine, and that the priority should now be on putting Ukraine in the strongest possible position before these talks start.
