Is French President Emmanuel Macron's gamble starting to pay off? After organizing two emergency meetings this week in Paris with EU countries and NATO member states to devise a united response to the rapprochement between Moscow and the US, it looks like Europe is finally getting a seat at the negotiating table. Just after the second emergency meeting, held in Paris - mainly through video call - with 19 heads of state on Wednesday evening, US President Donald Trump's national security adviser Mike Waltz announced that Macron and UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer are invited to the White House early next week to discuss the war in Ukraine. After Russian and US officials met in Saudi Arabia this week, one of the main fears has become that Trump could reach an agreement with Moscow that would work against the security interests of both Ukraine and the EU. Tensions have been escalating between the US and Ukraine since the announcement of that meeting, which excluded Kyiv. On Wednesday, Trump called Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy a "dictator," adding the Ukrainian leader "better move fast or he is not going to have a country left." But other than a consensus on Russia posing a looming security threat to Europe, the bloc is deeply divided on how to respond, particularly when it comes to whether or not to send peacekeeping troops to Ukraine. UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer has repeated that he would consider deploying troops to Ukraine. But German Chancellor Olaf Scholz claimed on Monday after the first Paris summit that the question of foreign troops was "highly inappropriate" before a peace plan is decided upon. To keep pressure on the Kremlin, the ambassadors of the 27 bloc approved on Wednesday a 16th package of sanctions against Russia. Macron also posted on his X account that decisions concerning European security will be taken in the coming days and weeks, writing that the bloc is "convinced of the need to increase the defense and security spending and capabilities of Europe." Trump met Macron in Paris at the beginning of December, prior to the US President's inauguration, during a trilateral meeting at the Elysée Palace with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. — Euronews
