EU’s top diplomat: Peace deal without Ukraine and Europe is ‘dirty deal’

Any peace agreement to end the Russo-Ukrainian war without Ukraine and Europe’s involvement would fail, said EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, Kaja Kallas, on Feb. 13, ahead of the Ukraine-NATO Council meeting, as reported by European Pravda.

“As I say, any agreement without us will fail because you need Europe and Ukraine to also implement the agreement. So, without us at the table, you can agree on whatever, but it will just simply fail because the implementation is not there,” Kallas said.

She added that any quick resolution to Russia’s war against Ukraine would be detrimental and ineffective in reference to Moscow’s initial invasion in 2014 when a ceasefire was brokered twice in the Belarusian capital of Minsk. 

“Any quick fix is a dirty deal that we have seen before, when it comes to Minsk, for example, and it will just simply not work. It will not stop the killing. It will not stop the war,” Kallas said.

The EU’s top diplomat also drew a parallel to 1938, when the world failed to prevent Nazi Germany’s aggression, which eventually led to World War II at the cost of millions of lives.

“And right now, we also need to help Ukraine to defend [against] the aggression so that there won’t be any broader conflict,” she said.

The EU is already facing aggression from Russia, which is waging a hybrid war using information, energy, and food as weapons. In this context, Europe needs Ukraine’s support, said Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal in a column for Politico.

Shmyhal said that the bloc is no longer merely on the threshold of emerging security challenges, but is already experiencing them.

“But there is a country that’s not only faced various manifestations of Russia’s aggression and, most importantly, knows how to counter them. This country is Ukraine,” Ukraine’s prime minister said.

He also pointed out that the Ukrainian army, battle-hardened through combat, can serve as a real alternative to the U.S. military presence in Europe.

By joining the EU, Ukraine and its armed forces could serve as the backbone of a unified European army, a concept that has been debated across the continent for decades.

“After all, as Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni stated, the danger to European security, from Russia or from elsewhere, won’t stop once the war in Ukraine ends – and the EU must be prepared for that,” Shmyhal said.