\u201cIf Europe were to name a special envoy, the question is who does that person represent? Who do they report to?\u201d Volker asked. \u201cIf it were [Commission President Ursula]von der Leyen, that sidelines Kaja Kallas and the External Action Service [the EU\u2019s diplomatic corps] \u2014 most envoys have typically been within the action service, but then that would be at such a low level when they need to talk to Putin directly, it wouldn\u2019t work. <\/p>\n
\u201cBut then I can just imagine the discussions in the Commission if it were to be the Council who had an envoy. That would never fly.\u201d<\/p>\n
Officials confirmed that key aspects of the job \u2014 such as whether it would represent just the EU or the entire \u201ccoalition of the willing,\u201d including the U.K. and others \u2014 have yet to be worked out. Ditto the diplomatic rank, and whether to formally appoint a bureaucrat or informally delegate the role to a current national leader.<\/p>\n
Italian government minister Giovanbattista Fazzolari \u2014 an influential ally of Meloni whose\u00a0Ukrainian wife<\/a>\u00a0is credited with building support for Kyiv within Rome\u2019s governing coalition \u2014 said over the weekend that former Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi should be offered the special envoy job.<\/p>\n Another four diplomats, meanwhile, noted that Finnish President Alexander Stubb has often been considered a potential representative for Europe in any talks with Washington and Moscow. The center-right veteran diplomat has struck up friendly relations with Trump while playing golf, while his country shares a border with Russia and has been on the receiving end of hybrid campaigns<\/a> from the Kremlin.<\/p>\n According to one of them, relying on \u201ca sitting leader\u201d means they could be \u201ca bit more free in what they say.\u201d However, \u201canother question is figuring out what is the moment to speak with Putin. Is there a risk that if you do so, you\u2019re also in a way legitimizing his positions?\u201d<\/p>\n Two EU officials underlined to POLITICO that no special envoy role exists and that any talk of candidates was premature. That said, a third noted, \u201cnone of these jobs exist until they do.\u201d<\/p>\n Jacopo Barigazzi contributed reporting.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cIf Europe were to name a special envoy, the question is who does that person represent? Who do…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":694518,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7654],"tags":[766,768,2001,34,2000,299,12266,2440,2826,2596,660,43,33109,809,332,2663,811,1199,657,49,333,771],"class_list":{"0":"post-694517","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ukraine","8":"tag-alexander-stubb","9":"tag-borders","10":"tag-communications","11":"tag-emmanuel-macron","12":"tag-eu","13":"tag-europe","14":"tag-george-w-bush","15":"tag-giorgia-meloni","16":"tag-golf","17":"tag-kaja-kallas","18":"tag-kremlin","19":"tag-macron","20":"tag-mario-draghi","21":"tag-negotiations","22":"tag-russia","23":"tag-sanctions","24":"tag-security","25":"tag-services","26":"tag-ukraine","27":"tag-united-states","28":"tag-vladimir-putin","29":"tag-war"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115891309401695491","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/694517","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=694517"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/694517\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/694518"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=694517"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=694517"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=694517"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}