Volodymyr Zelenskyy is set to travel to London on Friday for a meeting of the “coalition of the willing” ahead of an expected summit between Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin in Budapest, as European leaders grow increasingly concerned that Ukraine is being excluded from peace negotiations.
The Ukrainian president said the aim of the visit was to secure security guarantees for Kyiv, adding that there would be “many meetings and negotiations in Europe” this week. The announcement comes after a fractious White House meeting last week, during which Trump reportedly urged Zelenskyy to accept Russian terms for ending the war, including ceding the Donbas region.
EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas warned that “nothing can come out of these meetings if Ukraine or Europe is not part of it”, stressing that Putin would only negotiate seriously if he believed he was losing. The EU is considering a €140bn (£122bn) loan for Ukraine, funded by frozen Russian central bank assets, which leaders will discuss at a summit in Brussels on Thursday.
French President Emmanuel Macron reiterated that “Ukrainians should be at the table” when their fate is discussed, and “Europeans should be at the table” when European security is affected. Zelenskyy has said he is willing to join Putin and Trump in Budapest but has yet to receive an invitation.
According to reports, the Trump-Zelenskyy meeting descended into a “shouting match”, with the US president unmoved by Ukraine’s arguments. An unnamed source quoted Trump as saying: “You can’t possibly win back any territory… You should try to give diplomacy another chance.”
Zelenskyy has since called for an additional 25 US Patriot anti-missile batteries to defend against Russia’s escalating air war, suggesting frozen Russian assets could be used to fund them. Ukraine already has some Patriot systems but they are insufficient to protect major cities and energy infrastructure as winter approaches.
