Europe is using maximum opportunities to support Ukraine and put pressure on Russia, but to achieve a result, the United States needs to join the effort as it could provide a powerful impetus to the process.
This was stated by German Chancellor Friedrich Merz following the NATO summit in The Hague on June 25, an Ukrinform correspondent reports.
“There will be no military solution to this conflict. We must increase economic pressure on Moscow. The EU is doing this, tomorrow the 18th package of sanctions will finally be launched. But this alone will not be enough, we also need greater U.S. participation in such sanctions,” the head of government said and expressed hope that (Senator – ed.) Graham’s package will be included in the Senate agenda in the coming days.
Merz had the opportunity to speak personally with U.S. President Donald Trump on the sidelines of the summit about the situation in Ukraine, and to “once again express to him the insistent desire on the part of Europe that the American side also impose further sanctions against Russia.” After this conversation, the German politician had the impression that the latter was “thinking intensively about what he could do.”
“From my point of view, I told him again that it is now primarily up to him to provide appropriate further assistance. After what has happened in Iran in recent days, perhaps we could also use this momentum, not in military terms, but in terms of trade policy,” Merz suggested.
“With the options that we have in the European Union, we have objectively exhausted almost everything that we could do. The sanctions that America can now impose, what the Graham group is preparing for the Senate, primarily concern China and India. These are sanctions that only the United States of America can impose, not the European Union,” Merz said to the American leader.
The German head of government also discussed the situation with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and thanked him for his willingness to take on a mediating role and provide a venue for such a meeting. He asked Erdogan to “influence Russia and the Russian president to sit down at the negotiating table so that after these terrible three and a half years of war in Ukraine and bloodshed there, a peaceful solution can finally be found.”
As Ukrinform reported, the NATO summit was held in The Hague on June 24-25, on the sidelines of which Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky also held bilateral and multilateral meetings.
Photo: NATO / Flickr
Source: Merz calls on Trump to ramp up economic pressure on Moscow
