Good morning colleagues.
Can I just start by thanking you all for making time for this important meeting this morning.
We’ve got a lot to discuss because since we last met in person in London just under two weeks ago a lot has happened, particularly in the last week.
So it’s very important we catch up to move forward.
I think what this week has shown, particularly the developments and progress on Tuesday, is that President Zelenskyy, who is with us this morning, has shown once again, that Ukraine is the party of peace because he has agreed to and committed to a 30-day unconditional ceasefire.
Now what we see, and this is the centrepiece for our discussions today, is that Putin is the one trying to delay.
And in a sense, and you all know this, if Putin is serious about peace, it’s very simple: he has to stop his barbaric attacks on Ukraine and agree to a ceasefire.
And the world is watching.
And my feeling is that sooner or later Putin is going to have to come to the table and engage in serious discussions.
But, and this is a big but, for us this morning in our meeting, we can’t sit back and simply wait for that to happen.
We have to keep pushing ahead, pushing forward and preparing for peace.
And a peace that will be secure and that will last, and I think that means strengthening Ukraine so they can defend themselves, and strengthening obviously in terms of military capability, in terms of funding and in terms of the provision of further support from all of us to Ukraine.
Secondly, being prepared to defend any deal ourselves through a Coalition of the Willing. We’ve begun that process this morning and we can take it forward.
Thirdly, and very importantly given the developments of the past few days, to keep the pressure on Putin to come to the table and I think that collectively we’ve got a number of ways that we can do that.
And so it’s those three areas we’ll focus on in this meeting: strengthening Ukraine, being prepared to defend any deal ourselves through a Coalition of the Willing, and keeping that pressure on Russia at this crucial time.
So that’s what this meeting is about.
