The foreign ministers of Germany, Norway, Poland and the UK spoke at the Warsaw Security Forum on Tuesday.
This came as investigators in Germany were chasing down suspects for a fire at a Starlink station in Poland, and as Ukraine’s European allies scrambled to deal with US President Donald Trump’s latest lurch into Vladimir Putin’s lap.
What did the ministers say about Russian diesel and Ukraine?
German Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul bemoaned the US decision to lift sanctions on Russian diesel as part of a deal to supply the US — seemingly struck as Trump panics about fuel prices with the Iran war still unresolved and a month to go until midterm elections.
“I would say this is not the time to lower the sanctions regime but to strengthen this,” Wadephul said, noting the new package of EU sanctions imposed on Monday.
“We are keeping our course,” he said, adding that Europe was asking the authorities in Washington to do the same.
UK Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband arguably found even clearer words.
“Within the bounds of diplomacy we should acknowledge that it’s been a very difficult few days,” Miliband said in the Polish capital that’s just a few hours’ drive from Ukraine’s western border.
Poland’s Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski, meanwhile, said he was counting on “our MAGA president” — a reference to Andrzej Duda of the rival PiS party whom Trump has often praised — to use his “friendship” with Trump to do two things.
“Number one: to secure a permanent US base in Poland. And, number two: to explain to him that Putin is the aggressor, and Zelenskyy is the victim of aggression, and you end the war by convincing the aggressor to limit his level of ambition, not by asking the victim to capitulate,” Sikorski said.
Norway’s Espen Barth Eide said it was important to focus on the actions of the last four years, also welcoming Monday’s latest round of Russian sanctions.
“I feel that what we’ve done over the last years … all of this is a very strong signal that Europe, together with Canada and — on most good days — also with the US, we are sending a very clear message to Putin,” Eide said.
Facing criticism at home as well, Trump on Tuesday said that the US was still sharing intelligence with Ukraine. He also said that other countries would be buying Russian diesel as part of the deal he announced, without being deemed to breach US sanctions, rather than the US buying it itself. This contradicted or possibly corrected his earlier statements.
Wadephul: Starlink sabotage shows Europe ‘in the crosshairs’ of Russia
Wadephul also told reporters during his visit that he had spoken with his opposite number Sikorski about the investigations into a fire at a Starlink station in Poland last month.
Two people with Turkish citizenship were arrested in Germany in the southwestern town of Nürtingen, not far from Stuttgart, on Monday. Based on comments from Polish officials, they are suspected of connections with organized criminality but are thought to have been working on behalf of Russia.
Wadephul said that this and other hybrid incidents across the continent showed that “we are in Russia’s crosshairs.”
The satellite-based Starlink internet service is used extensively by Ukraine’s military and so the fire was thought to be targeting accessibility across the border in the warzone.
“We’re being attacked and it’s not just happening in Ukraine but all across Europe,” Wadephul said. “That means we must strengthen our cooperation.”
But he also said that the arrests in Germany, which will likely lead to an exatradition process, showed how the security systems were working — both at the policing and intelligence-gathering levels.
He said he did not believe Russia would succeed in “dividing us” with such campaigns, saying that instead he expected they would galvanize European allies.
A private Polish broadcaster meanwhile reported two further arrests in Germany on Tuesday, although German authorities did not immediately comment on them.
Miliband praises Zelenskyy, but says ‘let us take seriously’ energy ceasefire idea
UK Foreign Secretary Miliband praised Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy for showing “extraordinary leadership … in the most difficult of circumstances” since Putin’s 2022 full-scale invasion, shortly after Trump’s call — mirroring Russian messaging — for presidential elections in war-torn Ukraine.
However, Miliband also said the notion of an “energy ceasefire” raised by Trump — seemingly unilaterally — was nevertheless worthy of consideration given the attacks on Ukrainian energy infrastructure and the onset of winter.
“So let us take up this idea of the full energy ceasefire and let us seek with President Trump to hold Putin to this full energy ceasefire, because that is what we need,” Miliband said.
Miliband noted how Zelenskyy had expressed a willingness in theory, even if Russia was yet to do so.
Wadephul added that, if possible, any such efforts to broker a partial ceasefire should also seek to incoporate grain exports and shipments in the Black Sea, particuarly to North Africa.
“This is still necessary. And let us please not forget this and urge Russia also to be ready to enlarge the ceasefire, not only for the energy sector but also for the Black Sea. Because this is needed to stop a lot of people in North Africa from falling into hunger,” he said.
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Edited by: Wesley Dockery
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