Ukraine war live: Zelenskyy to meet Starmer, Macron and Merz in London over peace push

For a fellow journalist wondering on stream if Merz “is the same guy who was here last week”: no, that was the German president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier.

Here they are for reference:

If you’re listening to our live stream from Downing Street now, you can learn a thing or two about how this sort of occasions are managed from the point of view of journalists that cover them.

We have just been given a five minute warning for the arrival of German chancellor Friedrich Merz, which someone adding a joke playing on the German stereotype of punctuality, saying: “oh, Germany? They will be on time then.”

(Oh, bless him. Don’t tell him about the state of things at Deutsche Bahn.)

Sitting down for their talks this afternoon, European leaders will be painfully aware of all sorts of comments coming from the US side over the weekend, including from the president Donald Trump’s oldest son.

Donald Trump Jr warned that his father may walk away from the Ukrainian war in a lengthy tirade against the purpose of continued fighting in Ukraine, as he also claimed Ukraine’s “corrupt” rich had fled their country leaving “what they believed to be the peasant class” to fight the war.

Trump Jr has no formal role inside his father’s administration, but is a key figure in the Maga movement. His intervention reflects the antipathy among some inside the Trump team towards the Ukrainian government, and comes as Trump’s negotiating team is putting pressure on Kyiv to give up territory.

Meanwhile, we are starting to look towards 10 Downing Street as the leaders should start arriving in the next hour. Last preparations are under way, and we have a live stream for you at the top of the page.

In the last few minutes, Volodymyr Zelenskyy has just landed in the UK, Sky News has reported.

The EU has just been asked for its response to Musk’s anti-EU outbursts over the weekend, with suggestions the EU was “the enemy of Europe,” a “bureaucratic monster” and should be abolished.

“Let me say that it’s part of the freedom of speech to put out even completely crazy statements,” the European Commission’s chief spokesperson Paula Pinho said.

She added that the recent fine must not have won the EU any love from Musk, but insisted: “The fine reflects non-compliance with law. It is not about ideology.”

“Otherwise, nothing to comment,” she said.

EU’s digital spokesperson Thomas Regnier also said:

“On the crazy statements that you’re referring to, … it takes 1 or 2 sentences to polarise the world, … to create escalations or tensions. It takes hundreds and thousands of sentences – and we’re doing it here, from this podium – to diplomatically appease tensions, because we have many shared challenges with our American friends. You may call this weakness. I call this strength. This is European strength, and this is what we will keep doing also with our US counterparts.”

Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said that there were competing visions of how to resolve territorial disagreements as part of any future peace settlement.

Speaking to Bloomberg News (£), he said there were “visions of the US, Russia and Ukraine” on how to solve this, but “we don’t have a unified view on Donbas” yet.

He also said Ukraine is pushing for a separate agreement on security guarantees from western allies, above all the US.

“There is one question I – and all Ukrainians – want to get an answer to: if Russia again starts the war, what will our partners do,” Zelenskyy said.

Imagine these questions to play a central role in today’s discussions in London.

Ukraine’s Zelenskyy will come to Brussels late on Monday for further meetings after his talks with British, French and German leaders in London, Nato has just confirmed.

He will be meeting with the alliance’s secretary general Mark Rutte and the EU leaders, commission president Ursula von der Leyen, and council president António Costa, it said.

The issue of territory is still the “most problematic” in talks on ending the Russia-Ukraine war, an official familiar with the negotiations told AFP, ahead of President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s meeting with European allies in London following US-Ukraine talks.

Territory is “the most problematic issue. [Russian President Vladimir] Putin does not want to enter into an agreement without territory. So they are looking for any options to ensure that Ukraine cedes territory,” the official, speaking on condition of anonymity said.

“The Americans are pressuring, like ’faster, faster, faster,’” the source added, saying that Ukraine “cannot agree to everything without working out the details.”

The Netherlands will earmark another 700m euros ($815m) to provide Ukraine with military support in the first quarter of 2026, the Dutch government said in comments reported by Reuters.

The government had earlier pledged 3.5 billion euros in support for next year, but a large part of that money has already been spent this year.

European Council president António Costa on Monday rejected any attempt by the United States to meddle in Europe’s politics, after Washington published a new security strategy sharply criticising the continent’s policies, AFP reported.

“What we cannot accept is the threat to interfere in European politics,” Costa told a conference in Brussels.

“The United States cannot replace European citizens in choosing which parties are good and which are bad,” Costa said.

“The United States cannot replace Europe in what’s its vision is of freedom of expression,” he added.

Costa said that the fact Russia had welcomed Washington’s new outlook as “largely consistent” with its own vision was a worrying sign.

Late last week, the new US national security strategy caused quite a stir, with its claims that Europe faces “civilisational erasure” within the next two decades as a result of migration and EU integration, and suggestions in a policy document that the US must “cultivate resistance” within the continent to “Europe’s current trajectory”.

In the latest development, which won’t exactly allay Europe’s concerns, the Kremlin has heaped praise on the US strategy, calling it an encouraging change of policy that largely aligns with Russian thinking.

“The adjustments that we see correspond in many ways to our vision,” the Kremlin spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov, said on Sunday. He welcomed signals that the Trump administration was “in favour of dialogue and building good relations”. He warned, however, that the supposed US “deep state” could try to sabotage Trump’s vision.

in Brussels

The leaders of seven EU countries have said a reparations loan for Ukraine based on Russian frozen assets is the most “politically realistic solution” to meet Kyiv’s urgent funding needs.

The prime ministers of Estonia, Finland, Ireland, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland and Sweden, said they strongly supported the European commission’s proposal for a reparations loan funded by the cash balances from the immobilised Russian assets in the EU.

The declaration of support was made in a letter to the European Council president, António Costa, and commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, ahead of an EU summit next week, when Ukraine’s financing needs will be top of the agenda.

The reparations loan is “the most financially feasible and politically realistic solution [and] it addresses the fundamental principle of Ukraine’s right to compensation for damages caused by the aggression” states the letter.

Last week German chancellor Friedrich Merz, who also backs the idea, flew to Brussels in an effort to persuade Belgium’s prime minister, Bart De Wever, to drop his opposition. No dramatic changes in position had been expected from the dinner meeting, also attended by von der Leyen. Most of the frozen assets in the EU are hosted in Belgium, which argues the plan is too risky and would complicate efforts to end the war.

The leaders who signed the letter disagree with the analysis that the loan would impede peace efforts: they argue that reaching a decision on the reparations loan at next week’s summit would put Ukraine “in a stronger position to defend itself and a better position to negotiate a just and lasting peace”.

Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy is to meet UK’s Keir Starmer, France’s Emmanuel Macron and Germany’s Friedrich Merz for talks in London about the war in Ukraine.

The meeting comes after three days of discussions between US and Ukrainian representatives in Florida without an apparent breakthrough amid an intensified push from Washington to end the war but with major territorial concessions from Kyiv.

Donald Trump once again sought to put pressure on Zelenskyy, suggesting publicly that the Ukrainian president “isn’t ready” to sign off on a US-authored peace plan. “I’m a little bit disappointed that President Zelenskyy hasn’t yet read the proposal, that was as of a few hours ago. His people love it, but he hasn’t,” the US president claimed to reporters on Sunday night. (Somewhat sidestepping the public rejection of the plan by Russia.)

The leaders are expected around early lunchtime and will talk behind the closed doors to plan the next steps.

I will cover the meeting here, bringing you all the latest pictures and lines on what’s going on at Downing Street.

Zelenskyy is later expected to visit Brussels and Rome. On Sunday Italian prime minister Giorgia Meloni spoke with Zelenskyy by phone and reaffirmed Italy’s solidarity after what she called a fresh wave of “indiscriminate” Russian strikes on civilian targets, her office said.

Separately, I will also keep an eye on the EU’s reactions to Elon Musk and senior US officials’s comments about the bloc over the weekend. The billionaire was particularly active on the back of a €120m fine against his social media platform X, repeatedly calling for the EU to be abolished.

And, finally, EU ministers are meeting in Brussels to sign off plans on migration and asylum laws.

I will bring you all the key updates throughout the day.

It’s Monday, 8 December 2025, it’s Jakub Krupa here, and this is Europe Live.

Good morning.