US Secretary of State Marco Rubio separately sought to ease tensions after European leaders expressed concerns over American negotiations with Russian officials in Riyadh, The New York Times reports.
The publication cites the summary of a phone conversation between Rubio and officials from the United Kingdom, France, Germany, and Italy, which came into its possession.
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“Mr. Rubio sought to reassure nervous European allies that the talks did not represent an abrupt departure from American policies, as many feared,” NYT reports.
A portion of the call was dedicated to explaining why Ukrainians and Europeans were not included in the talks.
During his discussion with European officials, Rubio said that the meeting in Riyadh was merely the first step in a process to assess whether the Kremlin was genuinely serious about reaching an agreement.
He assured his European counterparts that the Trump administration had no intention of imposing the terms of any potential bilateral agreements with Russia on Ukraine or Europe.
He also reassured them that the US would not lift sanctions against Russia without significant changes in Moscow’s behavior, though he did not rule out limited easing of some restrictions if Russia took steps aligned with the US administration’s expectations.
Rubio said, “The Trump administration was clear-eyed that Russia could be attempting to use the talks to sow divisions in the West or to ease its isolation on the international stage,” according to the summary of the call reviewed by the NYT, which categorized Rubio’s message to European officials as nuanced and conciliatory.
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It went on to say that European officials were unsure how to interpret Rubio’s measured assessment, which came at a time when their leaders were struggling to make sense of the apparent renewal of relations between Washington and Moscow.
Rubio also said that it was not yet possible to determine whether Russia was genuinely committed to a peace agreement but said that Moscow had given enough signals to justify further discussions.
He concluded the conversation by promising to keep US allies across the Atlantic informed of future developments and called for unity.
In the 24 hours following the meeting in Riyadh, former President Donald Trump made a series of statements and demands that aligned with Vladimir Putin’s position, blaming Ukraine for the war.
He called President Volodymyr Zelensky a dictator and falsely claimed that Kyiv had somehow tricked the United States into supporting a war that Ukraine itself had started.
Trump also mocked Ukrainian complaints that their country - after sacrificing tens of thousands of lives to defend its independence - had been excluded from negotiations about its future.
The US-Russia talks in Saudi Arabia on Tuesday, Feb. 18, organized after Trump’s phone call with Putin, marked the first high-level negotiations between American and Russian officials since before Russia’s full-scale invasion. Both sides were expected to lay the groundwork to facilitate future peace talks in Riyadh.
Both Washington and Moscow ruled out Ukrainian and European participation at this initial stage, while Zelensky vowed not to recognize the results due to a lack of participation by Kyiv.
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