Prime Minister Keir Starmer is hosting a high-profile international summit on Ukraine in London today (2 March 2025) as part of efforts to secure a just and lasting peace in the country.
The gathering follows a week of intense diplomacy, including Starmer’s visit to Washington D.C. and a series of discussions with world leaders.
The summit brings together leaders from across Europe and North America, including Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, French President Emmanuel Macron, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, and Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, alongside representatives from Denmark, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Spain, Canada, Finland, Sweden, Czechia, and Romania.
The Turkish Foreign Minister, NATO Secretary General, and Presidents of the European Commission and European Council are also attending.
The summit’s agenda focuses on three major areas:
- Strengthening Ukraine’s Position: Discussions will cover continued military and economic support, as well as increasing economic pressure on Russia.
- Ensuring Long-Term Security: Leaders will deliberate on creating a lasting peace settlement that guarantees Ukraine’s ability to deter and defend against future Russian aggression.
- Security Guarantees: Talks will focus on structuring European-led security commitments to Ukraine, alongside ongoing discussions with the United States.
Speaking ahead of the summit, Starmer reiterated the UK’s unwavering support for Ukraine, saying that there can be no peace negotiations without Ukraine’s direct involvement.
“Three years on from Russia’s brutal invasion of Ukraine, we are at a turning point. Today I will reaffirm my unwavering support for Ukraine and double down on my commitment to provide capacity, training, and aid to Ukraine, putting it in the strongest possible position,” Starmer said.
The UK has committed to increasing defence spending to 2.5% of GDP by 2027, with Starmer using the summit to urge European nations to strengthen their own defence contributions. The UK has also reaffirmed its willingness to deploy troops to Ukraine as part of future security guarantees.
“We have an opportunity to come together to ensure a just and lasting peace in Ukraine that secures their sovereignty and security. Now is the time for us to unite in order to guarantee the best outcome for Ukraine, protect European security, and secure our collective future,” the Prime Minister added.
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Good luck Starmer.
Let’s see if Europe can unite or not.
If not war will go on, Putin will eventually grind Ukraine down in a sea of bloodshed and leaving behind a wrecked country. He will then rearm, re-equip and go again. Possibly as quickly as within 12-18 months. The European NATO members need to coordinate on defence investments, achieving shared enablers and a much bigger reaction force. If there is a peace deal in Ukraine European NATO will need more than the proposed 30,000 troops as peacekeepers, they’ll need 60-90,000 with the back up of upto 250,000 more as a rapid reaction, heavy reinforcements. If European NATO can muster such a force than there is hope. If nothing comes out of this summit then there is little to no hope. Russia will be watching this closely.
Best thing for us now is to keep the war going as long as possible. The Russians won’t last much longer in the meat grinder and ultimately if we suck them in enough their losses of blood and treasure will be so bad what’s left of the country will break up. I know conventional wisdom is that Russia breaking apart is a bad thing however as an entity they are just too dangerous to exist especially if the western world is now split in two.
Europe can easily keep Ukraine in the fight at current levels. We outproduce the USA in basic required items like 155mm artillery systems and shells as well as FPD’s
No need any more for expensive US missiles like Javelin, the Russians are down to donkeys.
If European countries had got themselves into gear with basic manufacturing this would have been over some time ago.
The slowness of the ramp up has been truly painful to view.
If the 2.5% decision had been made in Boris’ time the ramp up could have then started and a more positive buildup of defence capability could have started.
Let’s face it, until Starmer was due to meet with President Trump, he wouldn’t even commit to when the U.K. would reach 2.5% GDP and rumours were circulating that it could be as late as next Parliament.
Then when the meeting was confirmed, Starmer suddenly found the money to go to 2.5% and brought it forward to 2027.
Love him or hate him, President Trump is forcing the Europeans into action. Nothing like this happened with Biden.
Russia is not invincible
Putin is in deep deep trouble economically, and he already burned through cold war legacy stocks (most of which turned out to be carp anyway)
Those cold war stocks took 50% of Soviet GDP for several decades to make.
Trump wants a quick cease fire to help Putin out. That won’t be happening.
For all the bluster, Putin won’t be starting WW3 next week, or even next year.
It looks like we are heading to a Korean War style frozen conflict and border zone. Putin will probably give Trump a verbal agreement not to attack Ukraine during Trump’s presidency, which will give Putin time to rebuild his military. After that… who knows. This is probably the best that Ukraine can get right now. Putin will gobbled up 20% of Ukraine, kept Crimea, and have a land connection to Crimea. Ukraine will not be in NATO or have any security guarantees. Trump can claim peace. Putin can claim victory. NATO could linger on as a US means of selling arms to Europe, telling us that Article 5 still counts… telling Putin something else. The US will get closer to Russia with MAGA in the White House.
As the Americans descend into isolationism, this could be a good thing for Europe. We have been in the shadow of the Americans for too long, and we should aim to be able to stand on our own. Trump’s isolationist policies will destroy the USA internally and on the World stage, but that’s their choice. We need to move on. It will take time and we need to start now. 3% GDP on defence minimum and increases across the rest of non USA Nato.
I want a strong UK, making its own choices on foreign policy and not pandering to the White House. Co-operation – yes when needed, but subservience – no. Buy British/European weaponry where possible, and boost our industry and job skill set.
I want a UK public that understands the risks we face (like we used to with the protect and survive ads), and the World backdrop, with the media giving far more coverage to it. If the public were educated properly they would be more supportive of defence spending and this would have a knock on effect on politicians.
Whatever happens this should be a wake-up call for UK rearmament. We should strengthen all branches of the military and reverse mad decisions like reducing tank numbers and our E7 buy. We need to accelerate ship building and speed up our Tempest programme. As a priority we need to build a UK land based SAM defence system with UK/European kit. An extra buy of Sky Sabre and land based ASTER 30 block 1 and later 1N/T and block 2. It is noe clear that we cannot trust the US to have our back.