On Tuesday 15 July, Europe’s foreign ministers welcomed the announcements made the day before by US President Donald Trump to deliver additional military equipment to Ukraine, financed by the other Allies, and to adopt “very severe tariffs” of 100% regarding countries buying Russian oil and gas if no peace agreement is reached in the next 50 days.
US Senators Lindsey Graham and Richard Blumenthal also introduced the Sanctioning Russia Act of 2025, which would impose secondary tariffs and sanctions on countries that “continue to fund (Vladimir) Putin’s barbaric war in Ukraine”.
“We welcome President Trump’s announcement to send more weapons to Ukraine, although we would like to see the US share the burden”, stressed EU High Representative Kaja Kallas after the Foreign Affairs Council.
“If we pay for these weapons, it is our support. It is European support. We are doing as much as we can to help Ukraine and therefore the call is that everybody would do the same. If you promise to give the weapons, but say that somebody else is going to pay for it, it is not really given by you, is it?”, Ms Kallas insisted.
On their arrival at the EU Council, several ministers demonstrated that they were open to funding. The Danish minister, Lars Lokke Rasmussen, explained that his country was “absolutely ready” to join the programme, pointing out that the Europeans did not have systems similar to those of the Patriots, which Ukraine needs. “We need to work out the details”, he added. “We will look at what we can do in relation to Mr Trump’s announcements and go from there”, added his Dutch counterpart, Caspar Veldkamp.
For his part, Poland’s Radislaw Sikorski felt that it was not up to European taxpayers to finance the equipment, but for “the aggressor [to do so], out of frozen funds”. Member States are divided on the use of frozen Russian assets and a discussion on the subject will take place at their informal meeting at the end of August, according to Ms Kallas.
Still no agreement on the 18th sanctions package. European ministers also took note of the US announcement on sanctions. “On the one hand, it’s very positive that President Trump is taking a tough stance on Russia. But on the other hand, 50 days is a very long time – especially considering they kill innocent civilians every single day”, stressed the EU High Representative. And while several ministers felt that increased pressure from the United States should go hand in hand with increased pressure from the EU, the EU Council was unable to adopt the 18th sanctions package, again due to Slovakia blocking it (see other news). “Now the ball is in Slovakia’s court, and we must get this deal done”, stressed Ms Kallas. Ms Kallas and Mr Sikorski were hoping for an agreement to be reached on Wednesday, the day of the meeting of EU ambassadors. (Original version in French by Camille-Cerise Gessant)