Europe joins Abu Dhabi Ukraine peace talks
France confirms participation in US-brokered negotiations despite Kremlin objections, as fighting continues across Ukraine.
By Ricardo Brooks ·
European leaders will join the next round of US-brokered peace talks between Russia and Ukraine this week, a development that directly contradicts the Kremlin’s stated position. French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot confirmed on Sunday that Paris intends to send a delegation to the meetings in Abu Dhabi. He stated, "France will be there and will ensure that Europe's voice is heard." The minister did not specify whether European officials would participate in direct negotiations or serve in an observational capacity.
The talks are scheduled for Tuesday and Wednesday. They had previously been framed as a trilateral session involving only the United States, Russia, and Ukraine. Russian Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov had ruled out a European role on Friday, arguing that the three-party format was already agreed upon. He criticized European governments for failing to agree on a single representative, though he acknowledged that Europe would eventually need to be involved in security discussions.
This is the fourth round of negotiations under the Trump administration and the first since Geneva in February. The process has restarted following a visit by US envoy Steve Witkoff to St. Petersburg in October. During that trip, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced the release of an American prisoner, a move that followed Trump’s lifting of sanctions on Russian diesel exports. Ukraine had opposed those fuel sales, arguing they funded Moscow’s war effort. Witkoff said the agenda for the current talks will cover postwar security arrangements, de-escalation measures, and humanitarian issues.
Russia’s delegation will be led again by Vladimir Medinsky, a senior aide to Putin who has attended most discussions since 2022. For the first time, the group includes Deputy Foreign Ministers Sergei Ryabkov and Mikhail Galuzin, as well as Yury Zhigarlovsky from the General Staff’s operations directorate and military intelligence chief Igor Kostyukov. The Institute for the Study of War noted that some of these officials have previously sought to slow down negotiations or push harder for Moscow’s demands.
The fundamental gaps between the two sides remain wide. Russia demands that Ukraine cede large portions of its territory and renounce NATO membership. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has insisted that any security commitments must be explicit about who would act if Russia attacked again. He warned on Friday that the potential agreement referenced by President Trump was "not simple" and "can be dangerous," comparing the situation to the 1945 Yalta conference where affected nations were excluded from decisions about their own future.
As diplomats prepare for the UAE meetings, the war continues on the ground. Zelenskyy reported that Russia fired 36 ballistic missiles at the Kyiv area on Saturday, with only four intercepted. He accused Moscow of treating diplomacy as a form of aggression. In southern Ukraine, the death toll from a strike on an aid distribution site in Komyshuvakha rose to at least 55. These developments occur as the Trump administration seeks to finalize a deal before a Democratic-controlled Congress takes office in January.
President Trump met with Kremlin envoy Kirill Dmitriev on Thursday and suggested the coming agreement might involve all of Europe. The talks also take place ahead of a potential trilateral meeting between Trump, Chinese President Xi, and Putin at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Shenzhen later this month.
