On Thursday 29 June, European leaders announced that the European Union and its Member States were ready to contribute, together with their partners, to future security commitments to Ukraine, “which will help Ukraine defend itself in the long term, deter acts of aggression and resist destabilisation efforts”.
According to one European diplomat, “to contribute” means that the EU is not going to do everything on its own, but that it is capable of playing its part and is “legitimate” in doing so, given what it has done since the beginning of the conflict.
“In this regard, (the leaders) will swiftly consider the modalities of such contribution”, state the conclusions adopted by the European Council. A European source hoped that progress would be made on this issue in the coming weeks. “Safety guarantees must be clearly defined, and all the Member States agree”, the source added.
The Belgian Prime Minister, Alexander De Croo, felt that the discussion had been important in relation to the discussion taking place within NATO concerning security guarantees, but also within the EU, “where countries already give a lot of security elements without this being translated into concrete security guarantees”. “But we can see that (...) the approach is taking shape”, he added.
The issue relates to the definition of security commitments. This could involve reinforcing what the EU is already doing, whether with the ‘European Peace Facility’, military training or munitions. The High Representative of the Union, Josep Borrell, pointed out that the EU’s overall military support to Ukraine already amounts to more than €15 billion.
According to another European source, during his discussion with European leaders, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg explained that the candidate status granted to Ukraine by the EU was an additional dimension to be taken into account when considering security guarantees.
“We want to achieve a clear position on Ukraine in terms of guarantees. (...) We cannot leave Ukraine alone without a long-term peace agreement, and we will continue to support it by all means. This is our commitment”, stressed Slovak Prime Minister Ľudovít Ódor.
“We agree that we owe Ukraine something related to security, and we will do so in the future”, added German Chancellor Olaf Scholz.
For the Dutch Prime Minister, Mark Rutte, “security guarantees will mainly follow the path of defence cooperation with Ukraine”.
Several leaders felt that security commitments should be given by NATO. For the Latvian Prime Minister, Krisjanis Kariņš, “security guarantees for Ukraine is NATO. Ukraine and the EU need Ukraine’s full NATO membership after the war”. “The only working and the cheapest guarantee is NATO membership”, added Estonian Prime Minister Kaja Kallas, adding that this was not a European issue, but one for the Atlantic Alliance.
The Allies are due to discuss this at the Vilnius summit on 11 and 12 July.
Mr Rutte added that the EU’s commitments should be complementary to the Atlantic Alliance. “This is a sensitive issue, because a number of EU countries are not members of NATO”, he explained.
Whatever commitments are made, they “will be taken in full respect of the security and defence policy of certain Member States and taking into account the security and defence interests of all Member States”, the conclusions state.
The Austrian Chancellor, Karl Nehammer, pointed out that “a lot has been done already in advance to find phrasing that is also acceptable for neutral States”. “We have made security commitments (by participating in the ‘European Peace Facility’, Editor’s note) (...), but we will not participate in mutual defence commitments”, Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar has already warned.
Furthermore, the Spanish Prime Minister, Pedro Sánchez, announced that he would be visiting Kyiv on 1 July, the first day of his country’s Presidency of the Council of the EU, as a symbol of the importance of Ukraine in the Presidency’s priorities.
See the conclusions of the European Council: https://aeur.eu/f/7u9 (Original version in French by Camille-Cerise Gessant with Thomas Mangin, Solenn Paulic and Mathieu Bion)