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LONDON: Britain on Friday called for a raft of measures against Russia to strengthen Ukraine’s hand ahead of any future peace talks, as Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky heads to London for discussions with key allies.
British Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s office said he would press a meeting of the “Coalition of the Willing” countries that have pledged to strengthen support for Ukraine to take Russian oil and gas off the global market, use frozen Russian assets to support Ukraine, and give Kyiv more long-range missiles.
The meeting comes after US President Donald Trump hit Russia’s two biggest oil companies with sanctions, in a dramatic U-turn after he said last week that he and Russian President Vladimir Putin would soon hold a summit in Budapest to try to end the war in Ukraine.
Starmer said Putin had shown he was not serious about proposals to end the war.
“Time and again we offer Putin the chance to end his needless invasion, to stop the killing and recall his troops, but he repeatedly rejects those proposals and any chance of peace,” Starmer said in a statement.
“We must ratchet up the pressure on Russia and build on President Trump’s decisive action.”
Friday’s talks in London will be a mixture of in-person and virtual, with NATO chief Mark Rutte, Dutch Prime Minister Dick Schoof and Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen expected to join Starmer and Zelensky in London.
Zelensky welcomed Trump’s energy sanctions in a trip to Brussels on Thursday, where he also urged European leaders to give Kyiv long-range weapons and use frozen Russian assets to arm Ukraine further.
Moscow has said it would deliver a “painful response” if the assets were seized under the plan to use them to provide a 140 billion-euro  loan to Kyiv.
In another bid to starve Moscow of revenue, the EU approved a 19th package of sanctions that includes a ban on Russian liquefied natural gas imports.

BRUSSELS, Belgium: EU leaders on Thursday tasked the European Commission to move ahead with options for funding Ukraine for two more years, leaving the door open for a mammoth loan using frozen Russian assets.
In broadly-worded conclusions adopted after marathon talks in Brussels, EU leaders stopped short of greenlighting plans for the 140-billion-euro ($162-billion) “reparations loan” — pushing that crunch decision to December.
But diplomats said the text was a step toward a potential agreement — though it was watered down in the face of strong objections from Belgium, where the bulk of the Russian central bank funds frozen after the 2022 invasion are held.
European Council President Antonio Costa said the bloc had “committed to ensure that Ukraine’s financial needs will be covered for the next two years.”
“Russia should take good note of this: Ukraine will have the financial resources it needs to defend itself,” he told a news conference.
The EU froze some 200 billion euros of Russian central bank assets after Moscow’s tanks rolled into Ukraine, and the European Commission has proposed using the funds to provide a huge loan to Kyiv — without seizing them outright.
Speaking beside Costa, Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen said there was still tough work ahead on the complex proposal.
“We agreed on the ‘What’ — that is, the reparations loan — and we have to work on the ‘How,’ how we make it possible,” she said.
Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky, who was in Brussels to shore up European support, welcomed the summit outcome as a signal of “political support” for the notion of using Russian assets to keep Kyiv in the fight.

 ‘Judicial questions’ 

The vast majority of the Russian funds is held in international deposit organization Euroclear, based in Belgium — the most vocal skeptic of a plan it fears could open it up to costly legal challenges from Russia.
The Brussels talks were focused largely on addressing those concerns.
Belgian Prime Minister Bart De Wever repeated demands for guarantees from all EU countries that they share the risk if Russia sues, and said other countries must also tap Moscow’s assets on their territory — threatening otherwise to block the plan.
“I’m only poor little Belgium, the only thing I can do is point out where the problems are and to gently ask solutions for the essential problem,” De Wever told reporters after the talks.
Belgium has not been alone however in raising concerns.
French President Emmanuel Macron acknowledged the plan “raises judicial questions, and questions over risk sharing” — while also saying it remained the best option for shoring up Ukraine these next two years.
The summit conclusions — adopted by all member states with the exception of Hungary, seen as Russia’s closest ally in the 27-nation bloc — did not mention the loan directly, instead inviting the commission “to present, as soon as possible, options for financial support.”
Still, a European diplomat described it as “a great success.”
Another diplomat said the compromise wording “does not close but does not rush” the sensitive matter of using Russian assets for Ukraine.

US oil sanctions 

The EU talks were taking place a day after the bloc agreed a 19th package of sanctions on Russia and US President Donald Trump hit Moscow with sanctions on two oil majors, Rosneft and Lukoil.
Zelensky hailed the US sanctions as sending a “strong and much-needed message” to Russia — whose leader Vladimir Putin hit back insisting they would not significantly damage the country’s economy.
“Good, I’m glad he feels that way,” Trump told reporters at the White House when asked about Putin’s response. “I’ll let you know about it in six months from now. Let’s see how it all works out.”
The US measures represent a major stepping up of its actions against Russia and reflect Trump’s frustration at being unable to persuade Putin to end the conflict despite what he calls his personal chemistry with the Kremlin chief.
Zelensky said he hoped Trump’s shift on sanctions would also herald a change of mind on giving Ukraine long-range Tomahawk missiles — after Kyiv came away from a meeting in Washington empty-handed last week.
The EU sanctions package meanwhile saw the bloc bring forward a ban on the import of liquefied natural gas from Russia by a year to the start of 2027, and blacklist more than 100 extra tankers from Moscow’s so-called “shadow fleet” of aging oil vessels.