Europe should take more responsibility for its own security, as pressure will increase after the inauguration of US president-elect Donald Trump, said Czech President Petr Pavel yesterday after a meeting of the heads of state of the Visegrad Four countries (Czech Republic, Poland, Slovakia and Hungary).
At the meeting, the presidents of the four Central European countries discussed the opportunities offered by the US election for Europe and the United States itself.
The meeting also touched upon the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the situation in the Middle East, the future of the European Union, and the related report on the bloc’s competitiveness, as well as the expansion of cooperation within the V4.
“We agreed that we expect an increase in pressure on Europe after the arrival of US President-elect Trump,” said Pavel after the meeting in the Silesian Beskids, which was attended by Slovak President Peter Pellegrini and Hungarian Tamas Sulyok, in addition to the Polish host Andrzej Duda.
“This means taking more responsibility for ourselves, and this will require us not only to spend more on defence, I would call it an investment in our security future,” Pavel added. The situation, he said, requires “much broader initiatives and more decisive action in terms of increasing Europe’s competitiveness face to face with the global environment”.
Trump will take office as US president on 20 January 2025. In early December, he said he would “strongly consider” withdrawing the United States from the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO), but he also said he would maintain the US role in the defence alliance as long as European countries paid for defence.
Trump also says he wants to end the fighting in Ukraine as quickly as possible, and has indicated that he plans a reduction in military aid to Ukraine.
Pavel told reporters that the V4 presidents had agreed at yesterday’s meeting that peace should prevail in Ukraine, but said that Poland, Slovakia, Hungary and the Czech Republic may have different views on what the path to peace should look like.
“What we certainly agreed on was the will to do our utmost to end the conflict in Ukraine as soon as possible,” Pavel noted, adding that they had not discussed a concrete path to such an outcome. He said there was no doubt that the process entailed great risks.
Pavel said he had not even tried to challenge the views of his Hungarian or Slovak counterparts, because their views will only be verified by practice, and the ambition of yesterday’s debate was not to reach agreement on specific conclusions.
However, Pavel said it was important for the Czech Republic that the peace be fair for Ukraine, and not set an unhealthy precedent for the future. An aggressor should not be rewarded with a gain of territory, because it could be a threat to everyone, stressed Pavel, a former Czech Chief of General Staff.
Slovak President Peter Pellegrini pointed out that the ideological differences between the governments were irrelevant to some issues. He said that it was the topic of defence and security that united the countries.
“If we differ in our perspective, the fact that we in Slovakia and Hungary were talking about the need to end the war and negotiate peace a year ago and our V4 colleagues are only now starting to talk about it, that is the only difference. But we all agree that we want peace,” Pellegrini said.
In response to this statement, Pavel recalled his previous appearances at home and abroad, noting that he had spoken in the past about the fact that peace in Ukraine cannot be just a wish.
“From my point of view, which ultimately corresponds with the view of many of our allies in the European Union and NATO, this can only be achieved by convincing Russia, through helping Ukraine, that it cannot achieve its goals militarily, and therefore through aggression. That the only way to end this conflict is at the negotiating table,” Pavel noted.
He added that in the current situation, he cannot imagine any other way for Russia to agree to come to the negotiating table. According to Pavel, Russia has so far only pushed for its own conditions, i.e. the unconditional surrender of Ukraine. “That would be a denial of all the principles on which the international order is based, and on which our security ultimately rests,” he concluded.
