LONDON — Donald Trump is “frustrated” with Vladimir Putin’s irrational approach to peace talks aimed at ending the war in Ukraine, according to Nigel Farage, the British politician who is closest to the U.S. president.  Farage said Trump was doing his best to secure a fair deal for Ukraine, adding that the current proposals for limits to the size of the Ukrainian armed forces and ceding territory to Russia were not acceptable.  “Putin proves with every week that goes by that he’s not rational, that he doesn’t want a just settlement, and frankly he is an incredibly dangerous man,” Farage told reporters on Thursday.  In response to a question from POLITICO, Farage said Ukraine had been offered a bad deal under which it would be forced to accept limits to the size of its military that would usually apply only to a country that had signed an “unconditional surrender.”  Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s position is in doubt amid a corruption scandal, Farage said. But Kyiv could not “give up territory they’ve lost tens of thousands of lives defending,” he said. “So the deal as it is at the moment doesn’t work and can’t stand.”  Farage emphasized that his comment was not a criticism of Trump’s efforts to broker a truce, adding that the U.S. president was “a peacemaker” who was doing his best to secure a fair deal. “I admire him hugely for it and I know how frustrated he’s been by Putin’s lack of rationality,” Farage said.  Farage’s assessment offers a boost to Ukraine and its allies who have worried that Trump might force an unbalanced settlement that favors Russia on Kyiv. The Reform UK leader’s remarks carry weight as he counts Trump as a “friend” and is in regular contact with the president. This week, Trump sent his son in law Jared Kushner and peace envoy Steve Witkoff for five hours of direct talks with Putin. But the Russian leader dismissed the proposals, which had been adjusted in light of input from Ukraine and its European allies. Trump said this week that the path to peace was still unclear.

U.S. President Donald Trump and his administration blame the EU and migration for what they say is imminent, total cultural unravelling in Europe.  The explosive claim is made in the U.S. National Security Strategy, which notes Europe has economic problems, but says they are “eclipsed by the real and more stark prospect of civilizational erasure” within the next 20 years.  “The larger issues facing Europe include activities of the European Union and other transnational bodies that undermine political liberty and sovereignty, migration policies that are transforming the continent and creating strife, censorship of free speech and suppression of political opposition, cratering birthrates, and loss of national identities and self-confidence,” the Trump administration says in the 33-page document released overnight.  That narrative is likely to resonate deeply among most of Europe’s far-right parties, whose electoral programs are primarily based on criticism of the EU, demands for curbs on migration from Muslim-majority and non-European nations, and a patriotic push to overturn their countries’ perceived declines.  The new security strategy offers a clear ideological alignment between U.S. President Donald Trump’s populist MAGA movement and Europe’s nationalist parties. The U.S. administration — which has developed increasingly closer ties with far-right parties in countries such as Germany and Spain — appears to hint it could help ideologically allied European parties. “America encourages its political allies in Europe to promote this revival of spirit, and the growing influence of patriotic European parties indeed gives cause for great optimism,” the strategy states. The document is a rare formal explanation of Trump’s foreign policy worldview by his administration. Such strategies, which presidents typically release once each term, can help shape how parts of the U.S. government allocate budgets and set policy priorities. In an introductory note to the strategy, Trump called it a “roadmap to ensure that America remains the greatest and most successful nation in human history, and the home of freedom on earth.” The Trump administration does concede that “Europe remains strategically and culturally vital to the United States,” but its views on the continent are aligned with the administration’s past negative public statements. Vice President JD Vance shocked the mainstream political class at the Munich Security Conference in February by attacking Europe over migration and free speech. The document also echoes the racist “great replacement” conspiracy theory, which asserts that elites are plotting to diminish the voting power of white Europeans by opening their countries’ doors to immigration from the African continent, specifically Muslim countries. “Over the long term, it is more than plausible that within a few decades at the latest, certain NATO members will become majority non-European,” the document states. The war in Ukraine is mentioned, in a brief departure from discussing Europe’s “civilizational erasure.” The U.S. stresses that it’s in America’s interest for the Kremlin’s war to stop, including in order to restore “strategic stability” with Russia. However, the U.S. administration claims that “unstable minority governments” in Europe have “unrealistic expectations for the war,” while also hinting they are hindering the peace process. The comments come as European leaders privately warn that Washington could “betray” Ukraine during peace negotiations with Moscow. In contradiction to NATO’s open-door policy for candidate countries, the U.S. administration also wants to “end the perception, and preventing the reality, of NATO as a perpetually expanding alliance.” While it’s no secret that Trump doesn’t want Ukraine to join NATO, that was also Washington’s position under his predecessor Joe Biden.  

Russia will seize Donbas as well as Ukraine’s southern and eastern regions one way or another, President Vladimir Putin warned Thursday in an interview with the India Today television channel. “It all comes down to this. Either we liberate these territories by force of arms, or Ukrainian troops leave these territories and stop fighting there,” Putin told the Indian news station ahead of a visit to New Delhi, where he is due to meet Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The Russian leader’s statement comes during yet another round of peace efforts spearheaded by American officials and reaffirms that he has no intention of backing down from his maximalist war goals. According to open-source maps of the conflict, Russian forces now control about 80 percent of the Donbas region, made up of Donetsk and Luhansk. Russia this week claimed it had — after more than a year of fighting — captured the key city of Pokrovsk, which Ukraine has rejected. Ceding Donbas was one of the points in the 28-point-plan, circulated by U.S. President Donald Trump’s team, which drew criticism from Ukrainian and European officials as heavily lopsided in Russia’s favor. An updated proposal watered down some of the more pro-Russian aspects of the initial plan. Meetings between U.S. envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner and Putin to discuss the updated plan yielded no progress toward ending the war in Ukraine, and instead saw the Kremlin blaming Europe for thwarting the peace process. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has repeatedly vowed that Ukraine will not give up Donbas as part of the ceasefire deal as that would give Putin a springboard for a future invasion.

HOW BELGIUM BECAME RUSSIA’S MOST VALUABLE ASSET Belgian Prime Minister Bart De Wever is unmoved in his opposition to a raid on Moscow’s funds held in a Brussels bank for a loan to Ukraine.  By TIM ROSS, GREGORIO SORGI, HANS VON DER BURCHARD and NICHOLAS VINOCUR in Brussels Illustration by Natália Delgado/POLITICO It became clear that something had gone wrong by the time the langoustines were served for lunch.  The European Union’s leaders arrived on Oct. 23 for a summit in rain-soaked Brussels to welcome Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy with a gift he sorely needed: a huge loan of some €140 billion backed by Russian assets frozen in a Belgian bank. It would be enough to keep his besieged country in the fight against Russia’s invading forces for at least the next two years.  The assorted prime ministers and presidents were so convinced by their plan for the loan that they were already arguing among themselves over how the money should be spent. France wanted Ukraine to buy weapons made in Europe. Finland, among others, argued that Zelenskyy should be free to procure whatever kit he needed from wherever he could find it.  But when the discussion broke up for lunch without agreement on raiding the Russian cash, reality dawned: Modest Belgium, a country of 12 million people, was not going to allow the so-called reparations loan to happen at all.  The fatal blow came from Bart De Wever. The bespectacled 54-year-old Belgian prime minister cuts an eccentric figure at the EU summit table, with his penchant for round-collared shirts, Roman history and witty one-liners. This time he was deadly serious, and dug in.  He told his peers that the risk of retaliation by the Russians for expropriating their sovereign assets was too great to contemplate. In the event that Moscow won a legal challenge against Belgium or Euroclear, the Brussels depository holding the assets, they would be on the hook to repay the entire amount, on their own. “That’s completely insane,” he said.  As afternoon stretched into evening, and dinner came and went, De Wever demanded the summit’s final conclusions be rewritten, repeatedly, to remove any mention of using Moscow’s assets to send cash to Kyiv.   Bart De Wever attends the European Council summit, in Brussels, Belgium, on Oct. 23, 2025. | Dursun Aydemir/Anadolu via Getty Images The Belgian blockade knocked the wind out of Ukraine’s European alliance at a critical moment. If the leaders had agreed to move ahead at speed with the loan plan at the October summit, it would have sent a powerful signal to Vladimir Putin about Ukraine’s long-term strength and Europe’s robust commitment to defend itself. Instead, Zelenskyy and Europe were weakened by the divisions when Donald Trump, still hoping for a Nobel Peace Prize, reopened his push for peace talks with Putin allies. The situation in Brussels remains stuck, even with the outcome of the almost-four-year-long war approaching a pivotal moment. Ukraine is sliding closer toward the financial precipice, Trump wants Zelenskyy to sign a lopsided deal with Putin — triggering alarm across Europe — and yet De Wever is still saying no. “The Russians must be having the best time,” said one EU official close to negotiations. The bloc’s leaders still aim to agree on a final plan for how to stop Ukraine running out of money when they meet for their next regular Brussels summit on Dec. 18.  But as the clock ticks down, one key problem remains: Can the EU’s most senior officials — European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and António Costa, the president of the European Council — persuade De Wever to change his mind? So far the signs are not good. “I’m not impressed yet, let me put it that way,” De Wever said in televised remarks as the Commission released its draft legal texts on Wednesday. “We are not going to put risks involving hundreds of billions … on Belgian shoulders. Not today, not tomorrow, never.” In interviews, more than 20 officials, politicians and diplomats, many speaking privately to discuss sensitive matters, described to POLITICO how European attempts to fund the defense of Ukraine descended into disarray and paralysis, snagged on political dysfunction and personality clashes at the highest levels. The potential consequences for Europe — as Trump seeks to force a peace treaty on Ukraine — could hardly be more severe. SPOOKING THE HORSES  According to several of those close to the discussions, the reparations loan proposal started to hit trouble when tension began to build between De Wever and his neighbor, the new German chancellor, Friedrich Merz. A Flemish nationalist, De Wever came to power just this past February after months of tortuous coalition negotiations — a classic scenario in Belgian politics. Three weeks later, Germany voted in a national election to hand Merz, a center-right conservative, the leadership of Europe’s most powerful economy.  Like De Wever, Merz can be impulsive in a way that is liable to unsettle allies. “He shoots from the hip,” one Western diplomat said. On the night he won, he called on Europe to work for full “independence” from the United States and warned NATO it may soon be history.  Amid delays and continuing failure to agree on a way forward, bad-tempered briefings have been aimed at Bart De Wever, and increasingly at Ursula von der Leyen, too, in recent weeks. | Nicolas Tucat/Getty Images In September, the German chancellor stuck his neck out again. It was time, he said, for Europe to raid its bank vaults in order to exploit immobilized Russian assets to help Ukraine. With his outburst, Merz apparently spooked the Belgians, who were at the time in sensitive private talks with EU officials trying to iron out their worries. Several officials said Merz went rogue in putting the policy into the public domain so forcefully and so early — before De Wever had signed up.  Five days later, von der Leyen discussed it herself, though she was careful to try to reassure anyone who might have concerns: “There is no seizing of the assets.” Instead, she argued, the assets would just be used to provide a sort of advance payment from Moscow for war reparations it would inevitably owe. The money would only be returned to Russia in the unlikely event that the Kremlin agreed to compensate Kyiv for the destruction in Ukraine.  The idea gained rapid momentum. “It’s important to move forward in the process because it’s about making sure that there is funding to meet the budgetary and military needs for Ukraine, and it’s also a moral issue about making Russia pay for the damage that it has caused,” Jessica Rosencrantz, Sweden’s EU affairs minister, told POLITICO. “In that sense, using the frozen Russian assets is the logical and moral choice to make.” THE SPIDER’S WEB  Most of the work of a European Council summit is already done long before the bloc’s leaders arrive at the futuristic “space egg” Europa building for handshakes and photos. Ambassadors from the bloc’s 27 member countries gather to discuss what the summit will achieve — and to thrash out the precise wording of the plans — during the weeks leading up to each meeting.  Ahead of the October summit, Belgium’s ambassador to the EU, Peter Moors, had been sending signals to his colleagues that making progress on plans to use Russia’s frozen assets would be fine. The problem, according to four officials familiar with the matter, was that Moors wasn’t speaking directly to De Wever, and all the decisions about Russian assets rested with the prime minister.  While others inside the Belgian government knew that the prime minister was implacably opposed to ransacking Euroclear, one of his country’s most valuable and important financial institutions, the diplomat negotiating the summit deal a few hundred meters up the road apparently did not.  That meant nobody in the EU machinery really understood just how serious De Wever’s opposition was going to be until he arrived on summit day with steam coming out of his ears.  Moors is well respected among his peers and within the Belgian government. He is seen as effective, experienced and competent, having had a long career in diplomacy and politics. Before he took on the role of ambassador to the EU, he was known as the “spider in the web” of Belgian foreign policy.  Several officials said Friedrich Merz went rogue in putting the policy into the public domain so forcefully and so early — before Bart De Wever had signed up. | Tobias Schwartz/Getty Images The trouble, it seems, may have been political. He was the chief of staff to De Wever’s rival and predecessor as prime minister, Alexander De Croo, and comes from a party that lost power in last year’s election and now serves in opposition. It’s hardly uncommon in politics for such distinctions to affect who gets left out of the loop.  The other complicating factor was Belgium’s political dysfunction. As De Wever himself put it, he had been locked in negotiations with his compatriots trying to agree a national budget for weeks with no deal in sight.  “I’ve been negotiating for weeks to find €10 billion,” De Wever said on the way into the EU summit. A scenario in which Belgium would have to repay Russia more than 10 times that amount would therefore be unthinkable, he added.  As the summit broke up with only a vague agreement for leaders to look again at financing Ukraine, officials were left scratching their heads and wondering what had gone wrong.  AMERICA FIRST   The question of what to do with hundreds of billions of dollars worth of Russian assets locked in Western accounts had been hanging over Ukraine’s allies since the funds were sanctioned at the start of the war in February 2022. Now, though, it’s not just the Europeans who have their eyes on the cash.  The American side has quietly but firmly let Brussels know they have their own plans for the funds. When EU Sanctions Envoy David O’Sullivan traveled to Washington during the summer, U.S. officials told him bluntly they wanted to hand the assets back to Russia once a peace deal was done, according to two senior diplomats.  Trump is increasingly impatient for Kyiv and Moscow to agree to a full peace treaty. True to their word, the Americans’ original 28-point blueprint for an agreement included proposals for unfreezing the Russian assets and using them for a joint Ukraine reconstruction effort, under which the U.S. would take 50 percent of the profits.  The concept provoked outrage in European capitals, where one shocked official suggested Trump’s peace envoy Steve Witkoff should see “a psychiatrist.” If nothing else, Trump’s desire for a speedy deal with Putin — and his apparent designs for the frozen assets — lit a fire under the EU’s negotiations with De Wever.  WASTED TIME   Many EU governments are sympathetic toward the Belgian leader. Officials and politicians know just how difficult it is for any government to contemplate a step like this one, which could theoretically open them up to punishingly expensive legal action. De Wever is worried the stability of the euro itself could be undermined if a raid on Euroclear forced investors to think again about placing their assets in European banks.  In recent weeks, von der Leyen’s most senior aide, Björn Seibert, among others, invested time in trying to understand Belgium’s objections and to find creative ways to overcome them. Moors and other ambassadors have discussed the issues endlessly, during their regular meetings with each other and the Commission.  But as the nights draw in, the mood is darkening. Amid delays and continuing failure to agree on a way forward, bad-tempered briefings have been aimed at De Wever, and increasingly also at von der Leyen in recent weeks. She has held off the decisive step of publishing the draft legal texts that would enable the assets to be used for the reparations loan. These documents are what all sides need to enact, alter or reject the plan. “We have wasted a lot of time,” Jonatan Vseviov, secretary-general of the Estonian foreign ministry, told POLITICO. “Our focus has been solely on the Commission president, asking her to present the proposal. Nobody else can table the proposal.” He said it would have been “better” if the Commission had produced the legal texts setting out the details of the loan earlier than Wednesday, when they were eventually released. “We have wasted a lot of time,” Jonatan Vseviov, secretary-general of the Estonian foreign ministry, told POLITICO. | Ali Balikci/Getty Images “We all have a responsibility” to speed up now, another diplomat said, while a third noted that even Belgium had been imploring the Commission to publish the legal plans in recent weeks. An EU official said everyone should calm down and noted that De Wever still needed to get off his ledge. Another diplomat said Belgium “cannot expect all their wishes to be granted in full.” WINTER IS HERE Merz is particularly agitated. He worries that it will be his country’s taxpayers who have to step in unless the assets loan goes ahead. “I see the need to do this as increasingly urgent,” the German leader told reporters on Friday. “Ukraine needs our support. Russian attacks are intensifying. Winter is approaching — or rather, we are already in winter.” De Wever, in the words of one diplomat, is still “pleading” for other options to remain in play. Two alternative ideas are in the air. The first would ask EU national governments to dig into their own coffers to send cash grants to Kyiv, a prospect most involved think is unrealistic given the parlous state of the budgets of many European nations.  The other idea is to fund a loan to Kyiv via joint EU borrowing, something frugal countries dislike because it would pile up debt to be repaid by future generations of taxpayers. “We are not keen on that,” one diplomat said. “The principle of saying Russia needs to pay for the damage is right.”  Some combination of these ideas might be inevitable, especially if the reparations loan is not finalized in time to meet Ukraine’s funding needs. In that case, a bridging loan will be required as an emergency “plan B”.  In a letter to von der Leyen on Nov. 27, De Wever underlined his opposition, describing the reparations loan proposal as “fundamentally wrong.”  “I am fully cognizant of the need to find ways to continue financial support to Ukraine,” De Wever wrote in his letter to von der Leyen. “My point has always been that there are alternative ways to put our money where our mouth is. When we talk about having skin in the game, we have to accept that it will be our skin in the game.”  “Who would advise the prime minister to write such a letter?” one exasperated diplomat said, dismayed at De Wever’s apparent insensitivity. “He talks about having ‘skin in the game.’ What about Ukraine?” RUSSIAN DRONES  Despite frustrating his allies, De Wever still has support from within his own government for the hard-line stance he’s taking. His position has been reinforced by Euroclear itself, which issued its own warnings. In a sign of how critical the subject is for Belgium, Euroclear’s bosses deal directly with De Wever’s office, bypassing the finance ministry.  Some also fear the threat to Belgium’s physical security. Mysterious drones disrupted air traffic at Brussels Airport last month and were spotted over Belgian military bases, suspected of spying on fighter jets and ammunition stores. The concern is that they may be part of Putin’s hybrid assault on Europe, and that Belgium would be at heightened risk if De Wever approved the use of Moscow’s assets.  Another major hurdle to progress on the loan is Hungary. Russia’s assets are only frozen because all the EU’s leaders — including Putin’s friend Viktor Orbán — have agreed every six months to extend the sanctions immobilizing the funds. Should Orbán change his mind, Russia could suddenly be free to lay claim to those assets again, putting Belgium in trouble.  In the end, the task may just be too big even for the Commission’s highly qualified lawyers. It’s far from certain that a legal fix even exists that could duck Hungary’s veto and Russian retaliation, keep Belgium happy, and avoid the need for European taxpayer money to be committed up front.  Mysterious drones disrupted air traffic at Brussels Airport last month and were spotted over Belgian military bases, suspected of spying on fighter jets and ammunition stores. | Nicolas Tucat/Getty Images As the next crunch European Council summit on Dec. 18 gets closer, European officials are feeling the pressure. “This is not an accounting exercise,” Estonia’s Vseviov said. “We are preparing the most consequential of all European Councils … We are trying to ensure that Europe gets a seat at the table where history is being made.” For the EU, one essential question remains — and it’s one that is always there, in every crisis that crosses the desks of the diplomats and officials working in Brussels: Can a union of 27 diverse, fractious, complex countries, each with its own domestic struggles, political rivalries and ambitious leaders, unite to meet the moment when it truly matters?  In the words of one diplomat, “It’s anyone’s guess.” Jacopo Barigazzi, Camille Gijs, Bjarke Smith-Meyer and Hanne Cokelaere contributed to this report.

Finnish President Alexander Stubb said in an interview published Wednesday that conditions for a just peace in Ukraine are unlikely to be met. “The reality is that peace can be good, bad, or some kind of compromise. The reality is also that we Finns must prepare for the moment when peace comes, and that all the conditions for a just peace we’ve talked so much about over the past four years are unlikely to be fulfilled,” Stubb said in an interview with MTV Uutiset. He added that “we are closer to peace today than yesterday” and that the coming days and weeks will show whether the negotiations yield any results. Stubb’s interview comes on the heels of meetings between U.S. envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner and Russian President Vladimir Putin, which yielded no progress toward ending the war in Ukraine, and instead saw Putin blaming Europe for thwarting the peace process. “We’re not planning to wage a war with Europe, but if Europe decides to start a war, we’re ready right now,” Putin said. A 28-point plan prepared by Witkoff and Russian negotiator Kirill Dmitriev was criticized by European and Ukrainian officials as it heavily favored Moscow. The updated proposal watered down some of the more pro-Russian aspects of the initial plan. Finnish Foreign Minister Elina Valtonen said Wednesday at a NATO foreign ministers’ meeting that Europe will soon be briefed on the latest peace talks but “apparently they have not been able to reach massive consensus last night in Moscow.” “Russia is not willing to make any compromise,” she said, adding that any peace deal must not only stop killing, but also include terms that “make Ukraine strong enough to in the future resist not only invasion on the military side, but also any political interference, which is fully in the Russian playbook.”

BRUSSELS — The EU will begin to ban all Russian gas imports to the bloc early next year after lawmakers, officials and diplomatic negotiators struck a last-minute deal over a key piece of legislation set to reshape Europe’s energy sector. Put forward over the summer, the bill is designed to kill off the EU’s lingering Russian energy dependency at a critical juncture in the Ukraine war, with Russia advancing steadily and Kyiv fast running out of cash. While Europe’s imports of Russian gas have fallen sharply since 2022, the country still accounts for around 19 percent of its total intake. The EU is already set to sanction Russian gas imports, but those measures are temporary and subject to renewal every six months. The new legislation is designed to make that rupture permanent and put member countries that still operate contracts with Russia on a surer footing in the event of legal action. “We were paying to Russia €12 billion per month at the beginning of the war for fossil fuels. Now we’re down to €1.5 billion per month … We aim to bring it down to zero,” European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen told reporters on Wednesday. “This is a good day for Europe and for our independence from Russian fossil fuels — this is how we make Europe resilient.” “We wanted to show that Europe will never go back to Russian fossil fuels again — and the only ones who lost today are Russia and Mr Putin,” Green MEP Ville Niinistö, one of the Parliament’s two lead negotiators on the file, told POLITICO. The law will enter into force on Jan. 1 next year and then apply to different kinds of gas in phases. Spot market purchases of gas will be banned almost immediately, while existing short- and long-term contracts will be banned in 2026 and 2027. A prohibition on pipeline gas will come into effect in September 2027, owing to concerns from landlocked countries reliant on Russian gas, such as Slovakia and Hungary. Finalized in barely six months, the law was the subject of fierce disagreements in recent weeks as the European Parliament’s more ambitious stance irked member countries concerned about the legal risks and technical difficulties of the ban. But despite fears that talks would be prolonged and even spill over into the new year, negotiators reached a compromise on key aspects of the law at the last minute. Now both sides can claim victory. Lawmakers, for instance, repeatedly pushed for an earlier timeline and ultimately ensured that none of the bans would enter into force later than 2027. The Parliament also secured commitments from national capitals to impose one of three penalties on companies that breach the rule: a lump sum penalty of €40 million, 3.5 percent of a company’s annual turnover, or 300 percent of the value of the offending transaction. Where the Council included its demands, the Parliament was able to water them down. For instance, lawmakers convinced member countries to tighten a controversial clause allowing countries facing energy crises to lift the ban — suspensions will only last four weeks at a time and will need to be reviewed by Parliament and the Commission. The Parliament also backed down from a push for a parallel ban on Russian crude imports in the same file after the Commission promised a separate bill early next year, as first reported by POLITICO. The Council did push through its controversial list of “safe” countries from which the EU can still import gas without rigorous vetting. Lawmakers complained that the list includes Qatar, Algeria and Nigeria, but have now accepted it, so long as countries can be excised from the list if they offend. MEPs gushed that they got far more than they expected and weren’t trampled by seasoned diplomats, as some had feared. “We have strengthened the European Commission’s initial proposal by introducing a pathway towards a ban on oil and its products, ending long-term contracts sooner than originally proposed, and secured harmonized EU penalties for non-compliance,” European People’s Party MEP Inese Vaidere, who also led the file, told POLITICO. “We achieved more than my realistic landing scenario — earlier phase-outs, tougher penalties, and closing the loopholes that let Russian gas sneak in,” said Niinistö. “This was about proving European unity — Parliament, Council and Commission on the same side — and showing citizens that we can cut Russia’s revenues faster and more decisively than ever proposed before.”

Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Thursday that his government is drafting reciprocal measures in case the EU decides to use the cash value of frozen Russian assets to finance a €140 billion reparations loan to Ukraine. “The government of the Russian Federation, by my assignment, develops a package of reciprocal measures in case this happens,” Putin told journalists during a press briefing in Bishkek. Putin said that using the frozen assets to finance the loan was akin to “theft of someone else’s property” — a move that would hurt Europe’s standing on the international stage. “It’s clear that this will have a negative impact on the international finance system,” Putin underlined. “The trust in the eurozone will decline, will fall abruptly.” Putin warned Europe will go through “an uneasy [economic] test,” given that Europe’s largest economy, Germany, “is in recession for the third year.” The European Commission has repeatedly said that the initiative would not confiscate the assets, which are currently held in the Brussels-based financial depository, Euroclear. The move has met opposition from Belgium amid fears of Russian retaliation. Rather than seizing the assets, the EU would effectively borrow money from Euroclear and wire it to Kyiv to finance its defense against Russian forces. The Commission will present the draft legal text for €140 billion Ukrainian loan very soon, Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said Wednesday.

The International Judo Federation announced Thursday that Russian athletes will be permitted to compete again under their national flag, with anthem and team colors in place. “Following recent developments, including the reinstatement of full national representation for Belarusian athletes, the IJF considers it is now appropriate to allow the participation of Russian athletes under equal conditions,” the federation said in a press release. “Historically, Russia has been a leading nation in world judo, and their full return is expected to enrich competition at all levels while upholding the IJF’s principles of fairness, inclusivity, and respect,” it added. The judo decision comes amid hints from senior figures in international sport that relations should be normalized with Russian athletes, who have been banned from many events and competitions since the Kremlin launched its full-scale invasion in February 2022. “Sport must remain a beacon of hope — a place where people can come together in peaceful competition. This is the essence of Olympism: Every eligible athlete, team and official must be able to take part without discrimination or political interference,” Kirsty Coventry, president of the International Olympic Committee, said during an event in Brussels last week. Judo, which is one of Kremlin chief Vladimir Putin’s favorite sports, has become the latest battleground in the discussion over how and when Russian athletes should be readmitted to global competition while the war goes on. “Sport must remain neutral, independent, and free from political influence. Judo, rooted in the values of peace, unity, and friendship, cannot allow itself to become a platform for geopolitical agendas,” the IJF said in its statement. The Russian athletes will return to judo competition at the Abu Dhabi Grand Slam 2025, the federation said.

The EU’s top diplomat, Kaja Kallas, warned on Wednesday that Russia must reduce its military power and make serious concessions to achieve a “just and lasting peace” in Ukraine. “In any peace agreement, we have to put the focus on how to get concessions from the Russian side, that they stop aggression for good and do not try to change borders by force,” Kallas said after an extraordinary meeting of EU foreign ministers. “We have one aggressor and one victim. The focus should be on what Russia, the aggressor, must do, not on what Ukraine, the victim, must sacrifice,” she added. Her comments come after U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration circulated a 28-point plan last week that alarmed Ukraine and its European allies for heavily favoring Moscow. Wednesday’s online meeting was seen in Brussels as a chance to “speak with one European voice” and set out the EU’s non-negotiables, ensuring all 27 members remain aligned as negotiations accelerate. Kallas said the draft plan did not include “one single concession” from Moscow and argued that a deal must impose obligations on Russia, including curbing the size of its army and military spending. “If you spend close to 40 percent [of total government spending] on your military, you will want to use it again, and that is a threat to us all,” she said. Kallas noted Russia’s history of hostility: “If aggression pays off, it will serve as an invitation to use aggression again and to use it also elsewhere, and that is a threat for everybody in the world, especially for smaller countries. And in Europe … there are only two types of countries, the small countries and those who haven’t realized that they are small countries yet.” On Sunday, officials from the U.S., Ukraine, France, Germany, the U.K. and the EU met in Geneva to revise the U.S. plan. Washington and Kyiv later said the talks produced an “updated and refined framework” for further discussions. Speaking in Strasbourg, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said that “thanks to the work of Ukraine, the United States and us Europeans over the last few days in Geneva, we now have a starting point,” while warning that “much more effort is needed.” Von der Leyen also confirmed plans to fast-track the use of frozen Russian assets to underpin a €140 billion loan to Ukraine, a move that Belgium opposed during last month’s European Council over concerns that Russian President Vladimir Putin would retaliate against Belgium, where the assets are held. Asked whether Belgium was wrong to block aspects of the frozen-assets loan mechanism, Kallas described its concerns as “legitimate” and said that “everybody around the table” was listening and working to mitigate the risks.

STRASBOURG — Ursula von der Leyen welcomed talks on a Ukraine peace deal led by U.S. President Donald Trump and said Europe considers there is now “a starting point” on a plan after days of negotiations.  A 28-point plan circulated by the Trump administration last week alarmed Ukraine and its European allies as it heavily favored Moscow. After days of pressure on Ukraine to agree to that contentious proposal, Washington and Kyiv said talks in Geneva generated an “updated and refined peace framework” for additional negotiations. “Thanks to the work of Ukraine, the United States and us Europeans over the last few days in Geneva, we now have a starting point,” the European Commission president told MEPs in Strasbourg. But she added, “We know that much more effort is needed.” Von der Leyen outlined  Europe’s key demands for negotiations involving “Ukraine, the United States and the coalition of the willing on the way forward.” She said no peace deal can include a limitation on Ukraine’s armed forces — as the first U.S. proposal outlined — as it would leave the country vulnerable to future attacks.  “Ukraine needs robust, long-term and credible security guarantees as part of a wider package to dissuade and deter any future attacks from Russia. And it is equally clear that any peace agreement needs to ensure that European security is guaranteed for the long term.” She also made clear it is a red line for Europe that there can be no changing of borders — the U.S. plan had Crimea and the Ukrainian regions of Luhansk and Donetsk being recognized as de facto Russian territory, and land in Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions frozen along current frontlines. Von der Leyen added that Ukraine must be free to join the EU if it decides so. “If today we legitimize and formalize the undermining of borders, we open the doors for more wars tomorrow, and we cannot let this happen.” In her address, von der Leyen also said the EU will accelerate its plan to use frozen Russian state assets to underpin a €140 billion loan to Ukraine. “The next step is now that the Commission is ready to present a legal text,” von der Leyen said— though she didn’t say when the document would be put forward. Europe’s plan to use the Russian sovereign assets to support a loan for Ukraine ran into fierce opposition at a summit last month from Bart De Wever, prime minister of Belgium, where the money is held. “I cannot see any scenario in which European taxpayers alone pay the bill,” von der Leyen said. The Commission president doubled down on the fact that Ukraine and EU countries need to sit at the table for any future decisions on the implementation of a peace treaty. “Nothing about Ukraine without Ukraine, nothing about Europe without Europe, nothing about NATO without NATO,” she said.