Following Thursday’s big speech on public sector reform, Sir Keir Starmer has since turned his attention back to foreign affairs. This morning the Prime Minister hosted a conference call with European and Commonwealth counterparts to discuss support for Ukraine. The ‘coalition of the willing’ met to discuss their response to Vladimir Putin’s contemptuous dismissal of their efforts on Thursday night. With the Russian President seemingly reluctant to entertain an imminent ceasefire, today’s ‘virtual summit’ was about maintaining a united front for the pre-negotiations.
In his remarks, Starmer told coalition leaders that ‘what this week has shown’ is that Ukraine is ‘the party of peace’ as President Zelenskyy is the one who ‘has committed to a 30-day unconditional ceasefire.’ He insisted that ‘sooner or later Putin is going to have to come to the table and engage’ but until then ‘we have to keep pushing forward and preparing for peace.’ This, in Starmer’s view, means three things: bolstering Ukrainian military capability, creating a coalition to defend a future deal and keeping up ‘maximum pressure’ on Putin to come to the table.
Following the call, the Prime Minister held a press conference at which he took his message public. Starmer repeatedly dismissed Russia’s posture on Thursday as mere ‘yes, but…’ – suggesting that Moscow was simply not serious about any negotiation. Having pinned the blame on Putin for the holding up talks, he told journalists that the ‘coalition of the willing’ will ‘now move into an operational phrase’. Military leaders of those countries committed to a peace force will meet in the UK on Thursday to progress practical plans for any Ukraine security guarantees. He added that ‘we will accelerate our military support’ and ‘tighten our sanctions on Russia’s revenues’.
In the Q&A that followed his conference, Starmer confirmed that his position on the necessity of a U.S ‘backstop’ still has not changed. He told viewers that the UK is still having detailed discussions with American counterparts and noted that Jonathan Powell, his National Security Adviser, returned from talks in Washington just this morning. Starmer added that leaders have spoken on what more can be done to hand over frozen Russian assets to Kyiv but he refused to say whether the UK is considering imposing a travel ban on individual Russians.
For Starmer, today’s conference was all about showing his ‘coalition of the willing’ is an active and viable proposal. Some 29 world leaders joined his call this morning, including the freshly-anointed premier of Canada, Mark Carney. Starmer argued that this ‘bigger group’ with a ‘stronger collective resolve’ and ‘new commitments’ showed ‘momentum building up’ and progress from a fortnight ago. With many in the White House skeptical about the value of European security guarantees, the Prime Minister will hope that today’s update demonstrates that his plan has genuine merit.
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