UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer speaks following the first summit on Ukraine at Lancaster House in London, 2 March 2025. Photo: EPA-EFE / CHRIS J. RATCLIFFE / POOL
British Prime Minister Keir Starmer is to host a virtual meeting with world leaders on Saturday to discuss the war in Ukraine, with representatives of some 25 countries in the EU, as well as Ukraine, Canada, Australia and New Zealand, expected to join the call, Downing Street said in a statement.
This is the second summit Starmer has hosted this month to discuss his proposed “coalition of the willing”, aimed at providing a peacekeeping force to guarantee Ukraine’s security after a final peace agreement is signed.
In a statement released by Downing Street on Saturday, Starmer accused the Kremlin of “playing games with President Trump’s deal,” criticising Vladimir Putin for “trying to delay” a US-proposed 30-day ceasefire to which Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has already pledged his support.
On Thursday, while signalling his broad support for a theoretical ceasefire, Putin was noncommittal in his initial response to the proposal, stressing the need to address the “root causes of the conflict” and expressing concern that Kyiv would simply use any cessation of hostilities to rearm and resupply its military.
Nevertheless, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Friday that there was reason “to be cautiously optimistic,” following a brief visit by US President Donald Trump’s Middle East envoy, Steve Witkoff, to Moscow on Thursday night, during which he is believed to have met in person with Putin at the Kremlin.
On Friday, Trump praised his administration’s recent diplomatic progress in a speech at the US Department of Justice, during which he said that the US “had some very good calls today with Russia and with Ukraine.”
“I think we've had some very good results. I haven't been able to say that to anybody else, I haven't wanted to say it until just before I came here, I got some pretty good news," Trump added, without further explanation.