26 nations vow to give Ukraine post-conflict security guarantees, says Macron

Thirty of Ukraine's allies have held another meeting of the 'Coalition of the Willing' as they continue their push for an immediate ceasefire and a bilateral summit between Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Russian President Vladimir Putin.

After the meeting in Paris, which was chaired by the French president Emmanuel Macron and the British prime minister Keir Starmer, it was announced that 26 nations had agreed to send troops into Ukraine as part of a ‘reassurance force’ as soon as a ceasefire is agreed.

Macron said that any soldiers deployed inside Ukraine would not be on the frontline, though he did not specify exactly where they would be stationed.

The French president also said that the U.S. president had agreed with Ukraine’s other western allies to increase sanctions on Russia if the Kremlin does not move forward with peace plans, and agree in the near term to hold a bilateral summit with Zelenskyy.

After a morning of meetings the allies had a call with the U.S. president to update him on the discussions.

The joint call with Trump came after the U.S. leader said he was pretty disappointed with Putin as the Russian leader had not yet agreed to take steps to end the conflict.

Security guarantees for Ukraine was the main topic of conversation, and Macron said the precise details of what U.S. backstop security guarantees for Ukraine would look like would be announced in the coming days.

He said the allies would work "to regenerate the Ukrainian army" so that it can defend the country and also discourage Russia from further incursions into Ukrainian territory in the future.

The coordination with the U.S. was bolstered by the presence in Paris of Trump's special envoy Steve Witkoff.

Witkoff has held several one-on-one meetings with Putin in Russia this year.

In the closing news conference, Zelenskyy said he thought that his Russian counterpart was not showing "any real willingness" to end the conflict.

Macron said the allies were hoping to see movement from Moscow in the coming days to take concrete steps towards peace.