LISBON (Reuters) -European Council President Antonio Costa said on Tuesday the process to make Ukraine a member of the European Union needs to advance and Europe has to be part of future peace negotiations alongside Ukraine, Russia and the United States.
Costa, who debriefed council members about Monday’s summitin Washington via a video call from Lisbon, told reporters afterwards that although there was much to be done and no guarantees of success, the very possibility of a bilateral meeting between Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy and Russian leader Vladimir Putin was “an enormous progress”.
“Now we all need to transform this possibility into reality, for the meeting to take place and be a success,” he said, calling for wider talks involving Europe to take place “as soon as possible”.
He also singled out Washington’s readiness to participate in security guarantees for Ukraine as “particularly important”.
“The basis for future guarantees are Ukraine’s own armed forces, whose capacity needs to be reinforced,” he said, adding that Ukraine’s future was not just about the security measures, but the prospects of stability and prosperity that EU membership would bring.
In the meantime, the bloc will continue its pressure on Russia to stop the war and is preparing another package of sanctions, Costa added.
(Reporting by Andrei Khalip, editing by Inti Landauro and Aislinn Laing)
