Vladimir Putin has said any western troops placed in Ukraine would be \u201clegitimate targets\u201d for Russian strikes, upping the stakes as Kyiv\u2019s allies scramble to come up with a convincing offer of post-war support to Ukraine.<\/p>\n
Speaking a day after the French president, Emmanuel Macron, announced still-vague plans for a package of support for Ukraine<\/a> backed by 26 nations, Putin on Friday said any guarantees that involved boots on the ground would violate Moscow\u2019s long-standing objections to Nato troops in Ukraine.<\/p>\n \u201cTherefore, if some troops appear there, especially now, during military operations, we proceed from the fact that these will be legitimate targets for destruction,\u201d Putin told an economic forum in Vladivostok.<\/p>\n While there is little sign that Donald Trump\u2019s efforts to forge a peace deal in the Russia-Ukraine conflict are any closer to success, European leaders have been trying to draw up security guarantees for Ukraine in the event of a future deal.<\/p>\n Thursday\u2019s meeting of 35 leaders in Paris was meant to finalise how the guarantees might look and to ask the US for support in implementing them. But many European countries, including Germany, Spain and Italy, have refused to provide troop commitments.<\/p>\n Even among those who are willing to put boots on the ground, initial suggestions earlier this year of a peacekeeping mission that could police a ceasefire line was quickly scaled back to a \u201creassurance force\u201d that would be stationed far from the front and provide training rather than combat assistance.<\/p>\n On Thursday, Macron announced that 26 nations had pledged to provide post-war security guarantees to Kyiv, which would include a land, sea and air presence. \u201cThe day the conflict stops, the security guarantees will be deployed,\u201d Macron said, during a joint press conference with Volodymyr Zelenskyy<\/a> at the \u00c9lys\u00e9e Palace in Paris.<\/p>\n Speaking in the western Ukrainian city of Uzhhorod on Friday, Zelenskyy suggested the plans would involve a significant western force stationed in the country. \u201cIt is important that we are discussing all this … it will definitely be in the thousands, not just a few,\u201d he said, after meeting the European Council president Ant\u00f3nio Costa.<\/p>\n However, Putin knows that western countries are unwilling to go to war over Ukraine<\/a>, and his threats on Friday look designed to further spook European capitals on the escalatory dangers of committing troops.<\/p>\n Trump has vacillated over what support the US might provide for such a mission. At a meeting with Zelenskyy and European leaders the day before he met Putin in Alaska, he appeared to promise some kind of US involvement but many are still blurry on the details.<\/p>\n