EU Parliament chief says Washington meeting could be 'game changer' for Ukraine peace

ISTANBUL

European Parliament President Roberta Metsola said Monday's meeting in Washington between US President Donald Trump, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and EU leaders could mark a “game changer” on the path toward peace in Ukraine.

“Yesterday's important meeting in Washington could be the game changer for a path to peace in Ukraine that we have all wanted and worked for,” Metsola wrote on US social media company X Tuesday.

She linked the discussions to the earlier Alaska summit between the US president and Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin, saying the joint engagement now meant “a chance for real peace is now realistic. Difficult, but not impossible.”

Metsola stressed that the EU is “at its core a project for peace” and will continue to strive for it.

“We know the cost of war all too well,” she said, but warned that any peace agreement must rest on firm guarantees for Kyiv’s future security.

“Real peace must be built on strong security guarantees for Ukraine in order to last and not simply be postponed to a larger war down the road,” she added.

Reiterating the EU’s principle of “nothing about Ukraine without Ukraine,” Metsola emphasized that Kyiv must remain in the driver’s seat of any negotiations.

“We know that a Ukraine that is not supported, that does not have the strength to deter those that would take it by force, will not be in a position to find that elusive peace,” she said.

“This is what Europe has been saying since day one. That is why we stand with Ukraine. That is why Europe will continue to play its part,” she added.

Trump, after the meeting at the White House, said they discussed security guarantees for Ukraine.

In a social media post late on Monday, Trump said he had called Putin, and begun arranging a meeting between the Russian leader and Zelenskyy, to be followed by a trilateral summit among the three presidents.