The U.S. sometimes seems "closer to Putin."
Belgian Prime Minister Bart De Wever has called for EU member states to empower the EU to negotiate with Russia, as efforts to make Moscow abandon the war in Ukraine have so far failed.
He stated this in an interview with the Belgian newspaper L'Echo, with quotes provided by Euractiv.
"Since we cannot scare Vladimir Putin by sending weapons to Ukraine, and we cannot economically strangle him without U.S. support, there is only one method left: to reach an agreement," he said.
According to him, Russia can only be brought to its knees with "100% support from the U.S."
However, De Wever believes that the U.S. is not fully on Ukraine's side, and it sometimes seems that they are "closer to Putin" than to Volodymyr Zelensky.
"Without a mandate to negotiate in Moscow, we are not at the negotiating table where the Americans will be pushing Ukraine to accept an agreement. And I can already say that this will be a bad deal for us," he said.
Recall that in December, French President Emmanuel Macron stated that Europeans should resume direct negotiations with Putin. European leaders, cautious about Putin's military ambitions, were outraged by their exclusion from peace talks led by the administration of U.S. President Donald Trump.
In February, Macron told reporters that efforts to restore dialogue with Putin at a technical level were ongoing. At that time, he stated that these contacts were taking place in coordination with Ukraine.
German Chancellor Friedrich Merz supported the idea of dialogue with the Russian Federation, but on the condition that these contacts do not interfere with the negotiation process to end the war.
