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Vance to Meet With Zelenskyy 02/14 07:08
Vance is expected to meet Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy later
Friday for talks that many observers, particularly in Europe, hope will shed at
least some light on Trump's ideas for a negotiated settlement to the war.
MUNICH (AP) -- Vice President JD Vance hammered home the U.S. demand that
the NATO alliance step up defense spending on Friday, ahead of a security
meeting in Europe at a time of intense concern and uncertainty over the Trump
administration's foreign policy.
The future of Ukraine is the top item on the agenda at the Munich Security
Conference following a phone call between U.S. President Donald Trump and
Russian leader Vladimir Putin this week, when they pledged to work together to
end the 3-year-old Russia-Ukraine conflict.
Vance is expected to meet Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy later
Friday for talks that many observers, particularly in Europe, hope will shed at
least some light on Trump's ideas for a negotiated settlement to the war.
NATO defense spending
Vance started his day in Munich meeting separately with NATO
Secretary-General Mark Rutte, German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier and
British foreign secretary David Lammy. He used the engagements to reiterate the
Republican Trump administration's call for NATO members to spend more on
defense. Currently, 23 of NATO's 32 member nations are hitting the Western
military alliance's target of spending 2% of the nation's GDP on defense.
"NATO is a very important military alliance, of course, that we're the most
significant part of," Vance told Rutte. "But we want to make sure that NATO is
actually built for the future, and we think a big part of that is ensuring that
NATO does a little bit more burden sharing in Europe, so the United States can
focus on some of our challenges in East Asia."
Rutte said he agreed that Europe needs to step up. "We have to grow up in
that sense and spend much more," he said.
Chernobyl drone strike
Hours before Vance and Zelenskyy were set to meet, a Russian drone with a
high-explosive warhead hit the protective confinement shell of the Chernobyl
Nuclear Power Plant in the Kyiv region, the Ukrainian president said. Radiation
levels have not increased, Zelenskyy and the U.N. atomic agency said.
Zelenskyy in Munich told reporters that he thinks the Chernobyl drone strike
is a "very clear greeting from Putin and Russian Federation to the security
conference."
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov on Friday denied Ukraine's claims. And
Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova said the Munich organizers
haven't invited Russia for several years, a decision she called "strange and
politicized."
U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio was supposed to join Vance and Zelenskyy
but was delayed when his Air Force plane had to return to Washington after
developing a mechanical problem en route to Munich. He took a different
aircraft, but it was unclear whether he would arrive in time for the meeting.
Trump, who upended years of steadfast U.S. support for Ukraine during his
call with Putin on Wednesday, has been vague about his specific intentions --
other than suggesting that a deal will likely result in Ukraine being forced to
cede territory that Russia has seized since it annexed Crimea in 2014.
"The Ukraine war has to end," Trump told reporters Thursday. "Young people
are being killed at levels that nobody's seen since World War II. And it's a
ridiculous war."
Ukraine's bid to join NATO
Trump's musings have left Europeans in a quandary, wondering how -- or even
if -- they can maintain the post-WWII security that NATO afforded them or fill
the gap in the billions of dollars of security assistance that the Democratic
Biden administration provided to Ukraine since Russia's February 2022 invasion.
Trump has been highly skeptical of that aid and is expected to cut or
otherwise limit it as negotiations get underway in the coming days.
Both Trump and U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth this week undercut
Ukraine's hopes of becoming part of NATO, which the alliance said less than a
year ago was "irreversible," or of getting back its territory captured by
Russia, which currently occupies close to 20% including Crimea.
"I don't see any way that a country in Russia's position could allow ...
them to join NATO," Trump said Thursday. "I don't see that happening."
But British Prime Minister Keir Starmer told Zelenskyy on Friday that
Ukraine must be allowed to join NATO.
Trump in recent days said he wants to reach an agreement with Ukraine to
gain access to the country's rare earth materials as a condition for continuing
U.S. support for Ukraine's defense against Russia. He confirmed earlier this
week that aides were working toward striking such a deal.
Asked Friday if a deal might be completed in Munich, Vance responded, "We'll
see."
Possible sanctions against Russia
Vance, in an interview with the Wall Street Journal, said that the U.S.
would hit Moscow with sanctions and potentially military action if Putin won't
agree to a peace deal with Ukraine that guarantees Kyiv's long-term
independence.
The warning that military options "remain on the table" was striking
language from a Trump administration that's repeatedly underscored a desire to
quickly end the war.
Zelenskyy won't accept agreements made without Ukraine
The U.S. reassurances may have somewhat allayed Zelenskyy's fears, although
they will not replace any lost military or economic support that President Joe
Biden's administration had provided.
The Ukrainian leader conceded Thursday that it was "not very pleasant" that
Trump spoke first to Putin. But he said the main issue was to "not allow
everything to go according to Putin's plan."
"We cannot accept it, as an independent country, any agreements (made)
without us," Zelenskyy said as he visited a nuclear power plant in western
Ukraine.
European turning point
The track Trump is taking also has rocked Europe, much as his dismissive
comments about France and Germany did during his first term.
French Deputy Foreign Minister Benjamin Haddad described Europe as being at
a turning point, with the ground shifting rapidly under its feet, and said
Europe must wean itself off its reliance on the United States for its security.
He warned that handing a victory to Russia in Ukraine could have repercussions
in Asia, too.
"I think we're not sufficiently grasping the extent to which our world is
changing. Both our competitors and our allies are busy accelerating," Haddad
told broadcaster France Info on Thursday.
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