Europe must keep the financial pressure on Russia even though a ceasefire has never seemed closer in Ukraine’s three-year war with Moscow, the chief of staff to Volodymyr Zelenskyy, the Ukrainian president, has written in the Guardian as he starts talks in Jeddah with the US about the terms of any truce.
The US secretary of state, Marco Rubio, has convened the talks to test Ukraine’s willingness to make concessions to Russia to achieve peace, but Andriy Yermak has urged Europe “to remain united to counter Russian aggression now and deter it in the future”.
He was writing as Ukraine targeted Moscow early on Tuesday in what authorities said was its largest-ever drone attack on the Russian capital.
Yermak called for Europe to maintain all Russian assets held in European banks under embargo, with the profits used to sustain Ukraine’s financial recovery.
“Allowing Russia to reclaim these funds after its war of aggression would have catastrophic consequences,” he said. His remarks highlighted one of the potential sticking points in any ceasefire talks between Ukraine and Russia.
He said the €300bn (£253bn) in frozen Russian assets held in western financial institutions were “one of the most potent tools in Europe’s arsenal”.
It is part of a wider argument by Yermak that Europe must not prematurely dismantle the sanctions regime against Russia. He said it was important to “maintain the political and financial pressure to raise the cost of renewed conflict for Russia”, adding: “Europe cannot allow a ceasefire which serves only to allow Russia to rearm, rebuild its forces and come back for more Ukrainian lands and resources.”
He nevertheless gave an optimistic assessment of the possibility of peace, writing: “As I arrive in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, a ceasefire in the three-year war the Russian federation has waged on my country has never seemed closer. Recent talks between Ukraine and its partners give rise to great hope that the Ukrainian people will very soon return to the peaceful lives that they enjoyed before the war began in 2014 or the extreme escalation since 2022.”
But he said any peace must be “just and sustainable”. Praising the EU for its recent decision to increase defence spending, he added: “Stronger sanctions will close loopholes in the financial system, preventing European businesses and institutions from indirectly funding Russia’s war machine, while also setting a precedent for dealing with future threats. In the long run, Europe’s decreased dependency on Russia will bring geopolitical strength and market stability.”
Yermak made no criticism of the US decision to suspend military aid or to restrict Ukraine’s access to US intelligence, instead thanking the US for its support. But he did back calls for Europe to enhance its strategic autonomy in defence, an implicit acknowledgement that Europe could not in the long term rely on a leading US role in the defence of Europe. Rubio strongly hinted that if the Jeddah talks went well from the US perspective then military aid might be restored.
Yermak made no detailed mention of the possibility of a European-led force to help maintain a ceasefire. He wrote: “Ukraine must be given security guarantees that lend credibility to a future ceasefire agreement.”
Military chiefs from 30 European and Nato countries willing to contribute to security guarantees for Ukraine after any negotiated truce with Russia are meeting in Paris on Tuesday to try to make the nature of the offer of guarantees more explicit.
