US secretary of state says Ukraine must show ‘it is prepared to do difficult things’
US secretary of state Marco Rubio has been speaking to reporters on his flight to Saudi Arabia for talks with Ukrainian officials.
He says the point of the meetings is to establish Ukraine’s intentions and reach a point where peace is possible.
Rubio says he hopes to get an understanding of “where both sides truly are” and get “a sense of how big the divide is and hard it’s going to be”.
“The most important thing that we have to leave here with is a strong sense that Ukraine is prepared to do difficult things, like the Russians are going to have to do difficult things to end this conflict,” he says.
He adds that he doesn’t have any pre-determined words that each side need to say, but that both need to come to the understanding that there is no military solution to the war only a diplomatic one.
To that end, Rubio says: “I think the French and the British have been very supportive along the way over the last week as well, very helpful.”
He says the minerals deal – abandoned after Donald Trump’s Oval Office row with Volodomyr Zelenskyy – is still on table but not part of this conversation or the main topic on this agenda
On the vexed topic of intelligence sharing (see 14.11 post), he adds: “The Ukrainians are already receiving all defensive intelligence information as we speak.
“I think all the notion of the pause in aid broadly is something I hope we can resolve… what happens tomorrow will be key to that.”
Pressed further on the subject, he says: “Yeah, they [Ukraine] have the ability to defend themselves. But I don’t want to get too deep into the intelligence piece.”