European troops in Ukraine? Lavrov denies Trump's words

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Wednesday that Moscow was ruling out any possibility of deploying European peacekeeping forces in Ukraine. In his opinion, this would only fuel the conflict and make it harder to de-escalate. Earlier, US President Donald Trump said that Putin had accepted the idea.

French President Emmanuel Macron, visiting the White House on Monday, traveled to Washington to hold talks with Donald Trump, among other things, about the possibility of deploying European troops to Ukraine as part of a peacekeeping mission.

At that time, the US leader announced that he accepted this idea and said that Vladimir Putin also had no objection to such a solution.

On Wednesday, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov vehemently denied these words.

According to the leaders' declarations, in addition to the French and Germans, the British are also ready to send their soldiers on a peace mission to Ukraine. Prime Minister Keir Starmer is to discuss this during his trip to the US next Thursday.

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However, Lavrov, who has previously called the proposal "unacceptable", outlined Moscow's reservations about the European peacekeeping force in harsh terms, contradicting Donald Trump's loud announcements on Monday.

- We cannot consider any options when it comes to European peacekeeping forces. Trump said that the decision to deploy peacekeeping forces will only be possible with the consent of both sides. Apparently, this refers to us and Ukraine. Nobody asked us about it - he pointed out during his visit to Qatar.

According to Lavrov, the presence of NATO troops in Ukraine would only fuel the ongoing conflict and prevent its de-escalation. Moreover, in his opinion, it would be a "trick" that would only serve to arm Kiev.

Stressing in Qatar Russia's approach to a potential peace agreement in Ukraine so far, Lavrov said Moscow still wants full control over four Ukrainian regions it considers its own.

He also said there would be no agreement that would put both sides on the front line, indicating that Moscow was interested in a solution that would make the territory controlled by Ukrainians "less hostile" towards Russia and Russian-speakers.

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Ukraine has repeatedly denied the Kremlin's claims that it represses ethnic Russians and Russian-speakers on its territory.

- We need to talk about the root causes of the conflict and not resort to such simple technical measures as troop deployment. The root causes were the attempt to drag Ukraine into NATO and the complete eradication of Russian rights - suggested the head of Russian diplomacy.

The next U.S.-Russia meeting to end the war in Ukraine is scheduled for Thursday in Turkey.