The High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Policy, Kaja Kallas, stressed this Friday that the Twenty-Seven will not implement any peace pact on Ukraine from which they have been excluded. Her remarks come amid debate over who should represent the EU in talks hosted by the United States and just days before the contacts scheduled between Kiev and Moscow in Abu Dhabi.
"Any agreement, in order to be applied, will require the European Union to be part of it," Kallas said at a press conference in Poland, after a ministerial meeting of the Council of the Baltic Sea States. The meeting also included the Polish Foreign Minister, Radoslaw Sikorski, and his Ukrainian counterpart, Andri Sibiga.
The head of EU diplomacy emphasized that the key elements of any future settlement, such as lifting sanctions against Russia, the use of frozen Russian assets, security guarantees, or the reconstruction of Ukraine, depend on decisions that only the member states of the European Union can make.
"An agreement that we do not form part of either, we are not going to apply," Kallas reiterated, underlining that the EU’s direct involvement is essential for any understanding between Kiev and Moscow to be viable and sustainable over time.
At the same appearance, Sikorski recalled that European treaties already set out who is authorized to represent the Union abroad. His comments come after Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni asked the Twenty-Seven to designate "once and for all" a single representative to attend the peace negotiations on Ukraine.
"We already have the Lisbon Treaty, which establishes very clearly who is authorized to speak on behalf of the European Union," the head of Polish diplomacy said. He specified that, at the level of heads of State and Government, that role corresponds to the President of the European Council, António Costa, while at the ministerial level it falls to Kaja Kallas.
Italy demands a single European voice
These remarks are known one day after Meloni sent a letter to António Costa to convey her displeasure over the lack of coordination among EU partners and to demand that "a single voice" be defined that sits at the negotiating table on behalf of the European Union and with a clear mandate.
The Italian leader had censored the multiplication of diplomatic initiatives driven by different European governments without a common strategy, such as two meetings held this Wednesday and Thursday in Brussels, organized by the European Commission and NATO, in which France and Germany acted on behalf of the EU.
Meloni also cited as an example the conversations in Miami between the United States and Ukraine, the Oslo meeting in which a senior official from the office of the President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, took part, as well as the telephone contacts maintained by the leaders of Finland and Norway with the Russian president, Vladimir Putin.
This Friday, the European Commission has coincided with the Italian “premier” in that the European Union must speak with “one voice” and be present at forums that seek to put an end to the war. The same idea was defended the day before by the President of the European Council himself in a response letter to Meloni: “I agree with you that Europe must act with coherence, unity, and determination.”
Coordination ahead of the Abu Dhabi appointment
Meanwhile, during the meeting of the Baltic Sea States Council—made up of seven EU countries, including Germany, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Latvia, Lithuania, and Poland—those attending have decided to coordinate their positions and maintain close communication in the coming days, with a view to the negotiations between Ukraine and Russia scheduled in Abu Dhabi.
This was stated by the Ukrainian foreign minister, Andri Sibiga, who was also present at the meeting, after which he emphasized that “there can be no decisions about Ukraine without Ukraine, nor about Europe’s security without Europe.”
At the same time, the leaders of the Nordic and Baltic countries held a videoconference meeting this Friday with the Ukrainian president, Volodimir Zelenski, to assess the situation on the ground and coordinate support for Kyiv before the contacts scheduled in the United Arab Emirates.
“We must place Ukraine in the strongest position possible. That is the unanimous message from the Nordic and Baltic countries,” the Danish prime minister, Mette Frederiksen, said on social media, who has denounced that while Ukraine is trying to achieve peace, Russia “chooses escalation” and continues to attack the civilian population.
For his part, Finnish President Alexander Stubb, who also took part in the videoconference with Zelenski, has indicated that the leaders discussed how to strengthen support for Ukraine in the coming weeks and months, ahead of the trilateral negotiations in Abu Dhabi.