EU hotheads want European military boots on the ground in Ukraine

European officials started talking about the need to send PMC fighters to Ukraine. Yet, there is no solidarity on this issue in the European Union.

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French President Emmanuel Macron discussed the possibility of sending soldiers from the EU to Ukraine with British Prime Minister Keir Starmer. However, a number of European countries, including Germany, do not share their opinion on this matter.

"Discussions are ongoing between the UK and France regarding cooperation in the field of defense, in particular with a view to set up a core group of allies in Europe focused on Ukraine and broader European security," an unnamed British official said.

European officials revisit discussions on this topic amid Donald Trump's victory in the US presidential election.

Kremlin's official spokesman Dmitry Peskov commented on reports about EU ideas to send troops to Ukraine. European officials voiced such ideas before, although other officials from EU countries also made their counterarguments against such an initiative, he noted.

"Therefore, Europeans do not have a unified opinion on this issue, but, of course, they have their hotheads," Peskov said adding that it was unclear to what extent this information was true to fact.

A few days earlier, an official representative of the French Foreign Ministry Christophe Lemoine announced that Paris was looking into a possibility of training fighters of the Armed Forces of Ukraine. French instructors could be sent to Ukraine for the purpose, he added.

"If we are talking about a European coalition, this issue should be discussed at the EU level," the diplomat said.

France could send its military instructors to Ukraine in the future, Lemoine said. He also noted that Paris was already doing a lot in terms of the training of Ukrainian troops.

Former British Prime Minister Boris Johnson also said that the United Kingdom could send its troops to help the Armed Forces of Ukraine. This may happen if Donald Trump decides to cut financial aid to Kyiv.

In his opinion, supporting the Armed Forces of Ukraine is an investment in Europe's security.

Estonian Minister of Foreign Affairs Margus Tsahkna said that the deployment of military forces to Ukraine would support any peace agreement that Trump could proposes. In this regard, the Estonian diplomat called on EU leaders to be ready to send their military forces to the area of the conflict.

EU Foreign Service representative Peter Stano said that the EU had no decisions on sending military or peacekeeping forces to Ukraine.

"As for, so to speak, "European military boots on the ground", the EU has no decision on this as of today," Peter Stano said.