A day after Russia’s air assault on Kyiv killed 23 people, the European Defence Ministers are scheduled to meet in Copenhagen, Denmark, to discuss the war in Ukraine. Russia’s Thursday attack badly destroyed a European diplomatic compound.
The political leaders of Europe’s Armed Forces condemned Russia’s recent attack on Ukraine following the outrage. They called for stronger measures on Russia, such as seizing frozen assets, further sanctions, and increasing support for Ukraine's military and membership in the European Union. The ministers will further discuss European troops' deployment in Ukraine to guarantee security and monitor a peace that seems distant, as American efforts to broker peace between Ukraine and Russia appear stalled.
“Everybody understands that, considering how (Russian President Vladimir) Putin is mocking the peace efforts, the only thing that works is pressure,” said Kaja Kallas, foreign policy chief for the European Union.
Two missiles landed about 50 metres from an EU diplomatic mission in Kyiv, shattering the office's windows and doors but causing no injuries there. The EU summoned the Russian envoy in Brussels over the attack.
The UN Security Council (UNSC) scheduled an emergency meeting on airstrikes against Ukraine on Friday afternoon at the request of Ukraine and the five European council members — Britain, France, Slovenia, Denmark, and Greece. Two of Ukraine's top envoys were set to meet on Friday with the Trump administration regarding mediation.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt criticised both Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy after the Thursday attack on Kyiv.
She said that Trump “was not happy about this news, but he was also not surprised."
Leavitt noted that Ukraine has also launched effective assaults on Russia's oil industry in recent weeks.
“Perhaps both sides of this war are not ready to end it themselves,” Leavitt said. “The president wants it to end, but the leaders of these two countries... must want it to end as well.” In Copenhagen, Kallas said defence ministers from across the 27-nation bloc would discuss increasing sanctions on Russia, ramping up defence supplies to Ukraine's army and European contribution to postwar security guarantees, which could include EU training missions into Ukraine once a ceasefire is in place.
“We are discussing today how to change the mandate of those missions in order to be ready after any peace agreement is put in place,” said Kallas, who called for harsher sanctions targeting Russia's economic lifelines.
On Thursday, the United States approved a $825 million arms sale to Ukraine that will include extended-range missiles and related equipment to boost its defensive capabilities.
Lithuania's defence minister Dovile Šakaliene said that the attack on Kyiv on Thursday shows that hope now for peace is “naive” and that “all Putin is doing is really stalling, actually cheaply buying time to kill more people and to imitate sort of willingness to maybe stop his own murderous actions.” She said Europe must deal with Russia more forcefully, like seizing frozen Russian assets.
“That is actually one power that we are not using enough yet,” she said. “Over 200 billion of Russian assets would be extremely helpful in both pumping this money in the Ukrainian defence industry and buying American weapons.”
“It's imperative that those of us in the European Union now consider further sanctions, what more measures can be taken to increase the pressure on Russia to end this brutal and aggressive war on Ukraine and the huge impact that that's having on civilians,” said Simon Harris, Ireland’s Defence Minister.
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