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The United Kingdom and France will work on a Ukraine peace plan and mediate between Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelenskyy and U.S. President Donald Trump, after a meeting between the two spiralled into a row in the White House, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said on Sunday.
“We’ve now agreed that the United Kingdom, along with France and possibly one or two others, will work with Ukraine on a plan to stop the fighting, and then we’ll discuss that plan with the United States,” Starmer said in an interview with the BBC.
European leaders are scrambling to find a way forward after Friday’s disastrous meeting between Zelenskyy and Trump in the Oval Office. European and Canadian leaders are set to meet in London later Sunday for a security summit on Ukraine, which Zelenskyy will join.
Under the plan outlined by Starmer, France and the U.K. would lead talks on building a “coalition of the willing” to offer security guarantees to Ukraine in case a cease-fire is reached. The two countries have for weeks been involved in building a proposal to deploy peacekeeping troops to Ukraine after a hoped-for truce has been negotiated with Russia.
But the talks have stalled due to the uncertainty over whether the Trump administration would provide a so-called U.S. backstop that would deter Russian President Vladimir Putin from sending his forces against Ukraine again.
“I’m not criticizing anyone here, but rather than move at the pace of … every single country in Europe, which in the end would be quite a slow pace, I do think we’ve probably got to get to a coalition of the willing now,” Starmer said.
In Sunday’s interview, Starmer admitted he had not received assurances from Washington that the Trump administration would back European troops deployed to Ukraine. But the U.K. leader said a U.S. backstop is essential in order for security guarantees to work for Ukraine.
The security guarantees are “going to need a U.S. backstop, because it would not be a guarantee without it; it would not be a deterrent without it,” Starmer said.
Both Starmer and French President Emmanuel Macron have been engaged in intense diplomacy since the meeting between Trump and Zelenskyy spiralled into a dismaying argument in the Oval Office on Friday, with U.S. Vice President JD Vance accusing Kyiv of failing to show sufficient gratitude. A planned press conference and the signing of a minerals deal were cancelled after the fractious encounter.
According to an official from the Elysée Palace, Macron has spoken with Trump, Zelenskyy, Starmer and NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte in the last 48 hours.
In an interview with the Sunday weekly the JDD, the French president said coordination and “the need for action” would take place in London on Sunday, and later at an EU summit in Brussels scheduled for Thursday.
Mason Boycott-Owen contributed reporting from London.
