The ‘coalition of the willing’ held a joint call on Dec. 1, not a little concerned that they had failed to break U.S. President Donald Trump away from his Special Envoy Steve Witkoff and his productive dialogue with Russian President Putin. Der Spiegel leaked portions of the call, including where Finnish President Alexander Stubb – supposedly their special ‘influencer’ on Trump, who reportedly said that “we’re out, but we have to get in... We must not leave Ukraine—or Volodymyr—alone with these guys.”
Emmanuel Macron reportedly warned Zelenskyy that “there is a chance that the US will betray Ukraine on territory, without clarity on security guarantees”, Spiegel reported.
German Chancellor Friedrich Merz reportedly warned Zelensky to be careful because the U.S. negotiators, that is, Witkoff and Jared Kushner, “are playing games” with him and with their group. Der Spiegel reported that German officials at the Federal Chancellery would not comment on “purported scraps of conversation.”
Today, Kirill Dmitriev, the CEO of the Russian Direct Investment Fund and Russia’s Presidential Envoy, responded on X: “Chancellor Merz accuses the Americans of ‘playing games,’ both with you [Zelensky] and with us. Dear Merz, you are not even in the game. You disqualified yourself by warmongering, peace sabotage, unrealistic proposals, Western Civilization suicide, migration, stubborn stupidity.” He advised that, rather than injecting himself into the peace negotiations, he “should work on the domestic issues he ignores.”
In their coverage, RT noted that, earlier, Russian presidential aide Yury Ushakov had pointed to Brussels shutting itself out of the process by refusing any contact with Moscow, and the position of Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, that Europe has no place in the talks because it still seeks to use Kiev as a proxy to defeat Russia.
