French President Emmanuel Macron has accused those who call for limiting EU funding for Ukraine of defeatism. According to him, such a move would lead to an unjust peace.
“What is at stake in Ukraine directly concerns us. It is all our security that is at issue. Helping Ukraine defend itself means protecting France and the French people.
If Russia imposes its will on a European country through brutality, all of Europe is weakened.
That is why Ukraine was once again at the heart of our discussions on Thursday and Friday in Dublin, at the ninth European Political Community summit and the informal European Council meeting. There, we demonstrated our unity around two priorities that I want to share with you here.
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The first is to help Ukraine get through the winter. Ukrainians continue to resist with courage that commands admiration.
The latest discussions with the American envoys made it clear: Vladimir Putin does not want to negotiate. His army is not advancing. It is even retreating and suffering considerable losses. But it is clear that he is betting on forcing Ukraine to its knees by stepping up strikes against civilians and trying to plunge the country into darkness this winter. Our responsibility is to thwart that bet.
That means maintaining our financial support and helping Ukraine protect its people, its power plants and its electricity grids.
Let us be clear: those who want to ration Ukraine’s resources ultimately want to force it into an unjust peace, leave it permanently vulnerable, and thus leave Europe vulnerable too. That is a defeatist mindset. It is the recipe for the next war. That cannot be France’s position.
Our second priority is to work with Ukraine toward a just and lasting peace. Europe must play its full part in this, because our continent’s security also depends on that peace.
At the European Council yesterday, we reaffirmed our unity on this point.
At the European Political Community summit, we made a historic decision. At France’s initiative, 42 countries approved a declaration on the principles that must guide Europe’s security.
This is also the purpose of the work of the Coalition of the Willing, which we launched in early 2025 to prepare security guarantees for Ukraine. The declaration adopted in Paris earlier this year laid the groundwork. It provides for support for the Ukrainian army and preparations for a multinational force that can be deployed after a ceasefire. An exercise is currently underway in Poland to show that we are ready to play our part. We will meet again in Berlin on Thursday to continue this work.
We must now go further and state clearly, including to the Russians, what we want for the postwar period. We must also specify what we expect from the United States for Europe’s long-term security.
In any case, I want to state here my conviction that Ukraine, which has Europe’s largest conventional army, has a key role to play alongside NATO—a place where it fully belongs.
Our goal is clear: to secure a just and solid peace for Ukraine, then continue to work with everyone to strengthen a common security framework for Europe.
This is how we will protect Ukrainians, the French and all Europeans over the long term, ” Macron wrote on X.