Ukraine and four European leaders pressed Russia on Saturday to accept a high unconditional fire of 30 days from Monday, threatening Moscow with coordinated sanctions if it did not comply.
The ultimatum took place after the conversations in kyiv attended by President Volodymyr Zensky and the leaders of Great Britain, France, Germany and Poland.
The United States and other countries support the proposal, they said.
Kremlin spokesman told CNN that Moscow “will think of” the proposal, but emphasized “there are many questions” and that Russia is “resistant to any type of pressure.”
President Vladimir Putin did not comment immediately.
The unprecedented visit was the first time that the leaders of the four European nations made a joint trip to Ukraine.
“We end up now … We decided to support the fire that will begin next, without previous conditions,” said the president of France, Emmanuel Macron, to a press conference.
The leaders of 20 other member countries of the “Coalition of the provisions” that support Ukraine celebrated a videoconference with Macron, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk and Zelensky.
“In the case of a violation of this high fire, we have agreed that massive sanctions will be prepared and coordinated between Europeans and Americans,” Macron said.
The United States and Ukraine have been a similar proposal to a similar proposal, which Russia has not accepted.
‘Absolute Unit’
The president of the United States, Donald Trump, had threatened to get out of conversations about the lack of progress at the end of the war. Trump promised duration of the electoral campaign of the United States to stop the conflict within a day after taking office.
kyiv and his allies feared Trump was turning towards Moscow’s position, because he has faced Zensky. But Trump has recently expressed a growing impatience with Putin.
“The position we now have today is the absolute unit in a whole range of countries around the world, including the United States, which must be that high fire of 30 days,” said Starmer.
The five leaders in kyiv celebrated a call “fruitful” with Trump to update it at the meeting, said Andrii Sybiha, Ukrainian Foreign Minister.
“For the first time in a long time, we had the feeling that everyone is really united,” said Poland’s fang.
“We know that the real evidence is before us and before Putin. We will be waiting for Russia’s reaction.”
The president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, also supported the truce that said that “it must be implemented without preconditions to pave the path for significant peace negotiations.”
‘To build peace’
Macron said that the high fire would be “mainly” monitored by the United States, but that “Europeans will contribute.” He said that a truce would pave the way for “immediate work and negotiations with the parties involved to build a robust and lasting peace.”
The French leader does not have kyiv legs as June 2022, when it went with the Italian and German leaders of the time.
Later, European leaders hugging Zensky and joined him to place flashlights in a monument for fallen soldiers in kyiv.
For Merz, who assumed the position only this week, it was his first visit to Ukraine as Chancellor.
The symbolic show of the European unit occurred one day after Putin gave a challenging tone in the Moscow parade that marks 80 years since the victory in World War II.
Putin ordered a three -day unilateral truce from Thorsday until Saturday. But a Brigade of the Ukrainian army that operates in the East told AFP that the intensity of the fight had remained “practically the same.”
Serhiy, head of the evacuation department of a brigade in the east region of Donetsk, said the number of injured remained “just like before the high fire.”
Viktor, the driver of an evacuation ambulance in the Donetsk region, said there were still fighting, but less artillery and missiles.
He did not believe that Russia attached to a high fire of 30 days. “You can’t trust them, they are not a country you can trust,” he said.
