The German Chancellor Olaf Scholz urged the Russian president Vladimir Putin to find a diplomatic solution to the war in Ukraine and to reach a ceasefire. The request came during a 90-minute phone call between the two leaders, German government spokesman Steffen Hebestreit said. Scholz also demanded that Russian troops leave Ukraine and respect its sovereignty and territorial integrity.
The situation around the Ukrainian nuclear power plant in Zaporizhzhia was among the topics discussed during the telephone conversation, the Kremlin reported, according to which Putin drew the chancellor’s attention to the flagrant violations of international humanitarian law by the Ukrainian side.
The head of the Ukrainian presidency office, Andriy Yermak, and the former NATO secretary general, Anders Fogh Rasmussen, meanwhile today presented recommendations on possible security guarantees for Ukraine. The document was published on the presidency website, Ukrainska Pravda reports. The guarantees should be backed by several allied countries, which could be the United States, Great Britain, Canada, Poland, Italy, Germany, France, Australia, Turkey, as well as the Baltic countries and nations of northern and central-eastern Europe.
Among the points highlighted by the report, the need for resources to maintain a significant defense force in the face of Russian threats: lasting investments for the Ukrainian war industry, arms supplies, joint exercises with NATO and EU countries, intensive training missions and intelligence sharing.
Security guarantees must be politically and legally binding and such as to prevent a new aggression. They must also foresee the measures that would be taken immediately in the event of a new threat to the sovereignty and integrity of Ukraine. The report stresses that security guarantees do not represent an alternative to the Ukrainian ambition to join NATO.