Zelensky calls for security safeguard of 200,000 peacekeepers; US will work to end Russia’s war on Kyiv - Rubio

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Tuesday that ending Russia’s war in Ukraine would be official US policy under President Donald Trump, part of the administration’s goal of promoting peace.

Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping discussed on Tuesday how to build ties with Trump, prospects for a peace deal to end the war in Ukraine and Moscow’s firm support for Beijing’s position on Taiwan.

Security guarantee would need at least 200,000 peacekeepers - Zelensky

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who is seeking a meeting with US President Donald Trump, said on Tuesday that at least 200,000 European peacekeepers would be needed to prevent a new Russian attack after any ceasefire deal.

The Ukrainian leader, speaking at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, a day after Trump returned to power following months of promises to end the war in Ukraine quickly, also urged European leaders to do more to defend the continent.

The prospect of a rapid settlement has focused minds in Kyiv and Europe on the urgent need for security guarantees to prevent any future Russian attack, with the idea of a peacekeeping force circulating.

“From all the Europeans? Two hundred thousand, it’s a minimum. It’s a minimum, otherwise it’s nothing,” said Zelensky when asked about the idea of a peacekeeping contingent on an interview panel after delivering his speech.

That number is around the size of the entire French armed forces. Zelensky said at least that number would be needed as a security guarantee if Russia’s armed forces totalled 1.5 million personnel and Ukraine had only half that number.

He said such a force would only be part of the security guarantees that Ukraine needed.

The Ukrainian leader said Kyiv was working to set up a meeting between himself and Trump.

“The teams have been working on a meeting, they are currently in the process,” said Zelensky about those efforts.

Trump, who returned to office on Monday, has said he would stop the war in Ukraine swiftly, without saying how.

Zelensky said Ukraine would not agree to Russian demands that it drastically reduce the size of its military, predicting that Russian President Vladimir Putin would demand Ukraine cut its armed forces to a fifth of their size.

“This is what he wants. We will not allow this to happen,” said Zelensky.

In his speech, Zelenskiy said Europe must make itself a strong global player, able to guarantee peace and security for itself and others.

Secretary of State Rubio says US will work to end war in Ukraine

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Tuesday that ending Russia’s war in Ukraine would be official US policy under Trump, part of the administration’s goal of promoting peace.

Former US Senator Rubio, a China hawk and staunch backer of Israel, was the first of Trump’s Cabinet nominees to be sworn into office on Tuesday, after the Senate unanimously confirmed his nomination on Monday evening. Additional votes on other Trump nominees were expected this week.

During his confirmation hearing last week, the new top US diplomat said both Moscow and Kyiv would have to give concessions to end the war and suggested Ukraine would have to give up its goal of regaining all the territory Russia had taken in the last decade.

Rubio echoed those comments to NBC’s “Today” show on Tuesday ahead of the swearing-in ceremony.

“It’s going to be the official policy of the United States that the war has to end and we’re going to do everything possible to bring that about,” he said.

Former President Joe Biden, who sent billions of dollars of US weapons to Ukraine after Russia launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, insisted it was up to Ukraine to decide if and when to enter peace talks with Russia.

Trump, while campaigning for president, said he would quickly end the war, without saying how he would do so.

Rubio said it would be “complicated ... because every side’s going to have to give something.”

“The only way conflicts like this end is … not in public pronouncements,” said Rubio. “They end in hard, vibrant diplomacy that the US seeks to engage in, in the hopes of bringing an end to this conflict that’s sustainable, in a way that assures the security of Ukraine and our partners in the region, but that stops the killing and the dying and the destruction that we’ve been seeing for quite a while now.”

Xi and Putin discuss relations with Trump, Ukraine and Taiwan

Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping discussed on Tuesday how to build ties with Trump, prospects for a peace deal to end the war in Ukraine and Moscow’s firm support for Beijing’s position on Taiwan.

Xi and Putin, who spoke for an hour and 35 minutes by video call after Trump was sworn in as US president on Monday, proposed a further deepening of the strategic partnership between their countries which worries the West.

China and Russia declared a “no limits” partnership in February 2022 when Putin visited Beijing, days before he sent tens of thousands of troops into Ukraine. Putin has in recent months described China as an “ally”.

Putin (72), speaking from his Novo-Ogarevo residency outside Moscow and Xi (71), speaking from the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, called each other “dear friends”, and Xi told Putin about a call with Trump on Friday on TikTok, trade and Taiwan.

Xi and Putin “have indicated a willingness to build relations with the United States on a mutually beneficial, mutually respectful basis, if the Trump team really shows interest in this,” Kremlin foreign policy aide Yuri Ushakov told reporters in Moscow. “It was also noted from our side that we are ready for dialogue with the new US administration on the Ukrainian conflict.”

Ushakov said Putin wanted long-term peace in Ukraine, not a short-term ceasefire, but any deal must take into account Russia’s interests. No specific proposals for a call with Trump had been received, he said.

Slovak opposition says PM Fico undermining EU membership

Slovakia’s opposition accused Prime Minister Robert Fico on Tuesday of laying the groundwork to take the country out of the European Union, but dropped its no-confidence motion to dismiss him and his leftist-nationalist government.

Fico in turn accused the liberal pro-Western opposition of planning protests that would paralyse his administration in the latest show of growing tensions in the central European EU and Nato member country.

The opposition withdrew the motion in protest over Fico’s move to close the debate to the public on the grounds of discussing secret information, but it was bound to fail anyway given a slim parliamentary majority was expected to back his government.

Fico has worked to maintain relations with Russia during the war in Ukraine and halted official military aid to Kyiv, criticising sanctions imposed on Moscow and escalating a rift with Kyiv after it stopped the transit of Russian gas supplies at the end of 2024.

The four-time prime minister travelled to meet Putin in Moscow on an unannounced, private trip in December to discuss gas and Ukraine.

Fico, who leads the leftist Smer-SSD party, has also said Slovakia needed to prepare for “all possible crisis situations” that the EU could face in the short term, suggesting even a break-up of the bloc was possible.

“This cannot be read in any other way than ... what we had warned of: that the government of Smer is preparing the ground for leading Slovakia out of the European Union,” Michal Simecka, leader of the opposition Progressive Slovakia party, told parliament.

Fico told parliament that foreign policy was determined by Nato and EU membership, but warned of potentially unacceptable proposals to create an EU “superstate” where smaller, nations would have no veto powers.

Citing information from the national security service that he read out in the closed parliamentary session, Fico later told a news conference the opposition was “preparing to occupy government buildings, prevent the execution of government power, cooperate with abroad”.

Opposition leader Simecka called the accusations “absurd” and accused Fico of turning the parliamentary session into a “farce”, saying the opposition would call a new no-confidence vote.

Russia hits back with multibillion-euro penalty on Austrian bank

A Russian court’s order for Austria’s Raiffeisen Bank International to pay €2-billion in damages for a collapsed deal shows Moscow’s determination to strike back at the West, with companies bearing the brunt of the fallout.

Monday’s ruling, delivered to a courtroom where armed men in balaclavas sat among those involved in the case, is a blow to the biggest Western bank in Russia, which has made billions of profits there during nearly three years of conflict with Ukraine.

It marks a watershed for the bank that has provided a payment bridge for Russia’s middle class and companies into the West, requiring Raiffeisen to set aside a substantial amount for the loss even as it seeks to challenge the ruling.

The judgment, made as Trump was being sworn in as US president, serves as a warning to others, and prompted accusations by Raiffeisen’s lawyer that the court was biased and that the masked men were there to intimidate.

The Russian lawyers taking the action against Raiffeisen said the men in the courtroom were bailiffs there to ensure order, accusing their opponents of “bombarding the court with unfounded petitions”.

The penalty, issued by a court in the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad, follows the collapse of a deal involving Raiffeisen to release a Russian-owned stake in an Austrian builder, which unravelled under pressure from Washington. Now Raiffeisen has been lumbered with the bill.

“This is a final warning to all Western companies that you cannot do business with Putin’s Russia,” said Helmut Brandstaetter, a liberal Austrian legislator in the European Parliament.

The ruling adds to worries for Western firms still operating in Russia, which include the likes of food companies PepsiCo, Procter & Gamble, Mondelez and Italian bank UniCredit. DM