Washington – The Finnish president, Alexander Stubb, has proven to be fundamental in efforts to end the war between Russia and Ukraine, assuming a new importance after joining President Donald Trump for his mutual love for golf.
Minutes after emerging from a four -hour meeting with Trump, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and several other European leaders in the White House on Monday, Stubb described the results to NBC News.
“What we have agreed is to work on European and American security guarantees, essentially, which will be safe from the European perspective, coordinated with Americans,” said Stubb. “It is we who decide what type of security guarantees that we present for Ukraine, not for the Russians.”
He replied abruptly to the immediate rejection of Russia of the idea that these security guarantees would potentially include a presence of NATO.
“Russia doesn’t decide that,” said Stubb. “It’s as simple as that.”
Stubb, whose country joined NATO in 2023 in response to the invasion of Russia of Ukraine the previous year, said the leaders agreed on Monday that the security guarantees for Ukraine were among their main priorities, together with a bilateral meeting between Zelenskyy and the Russian president Vladimir Putin, followed by a trilateral meeting that included Zelenskyy, Putin and Putin Trump
For Stubb, Russia’s war in Ukraine is personal. Both his father and his grandfather were born in cities that were ceded to Russia after the invasion of Finland of the Soviet leader Joseph Stalin of Finland of 1939 and that remain part of Russia today. That story informs its commitment to Ukraine. Until the invasion of Russia of Ukraine, Finland, which shares more than 800 miles of border with Russia, had remained firmly neutral for decades, even during the cold war.
Stubb described his country as a regional “security provider”, pointing out his mandatory military service, great reserve forces and the arsenal of arms. “We have more than 60 F-18. We just bought 64 F-35. We have long-range missiles, air, land and sea, and we have the largest artillery in Europe, along with Poland,” he said.
Finland and other European countries represented in the White House on Monday, Great Britain, France, Germany and Italy, as well as the heads of the European Commission and NATO, are part of a group known as the Willing coalition, which also met virtually on Tuesday. Stubb said they have been working on how to help ensure Ukraine for some time, and decided at the White House meeting to order their military and officials who present a plan as soon as next week.
A location for a meeting between Putin and Zelenskyy has not yet been determined, but Stubb suggested Switzerland as a possibility. “Geneva could actually work,” he said. “I think it would be a neutral territory for it.”
Stubb said the goal is for the meeting to occur as soon as possible, hopefully “within the next two weeks.”
Switzerland Foreign Minister Ignazio Cassis said Tuesday that the country would grant Putin’s immunity to enter the country for said meeting, despite an arrest warrant for him for war crimes by the International Criminal Court of Justice. Putin would be at risk of arrest in most other countries in Europe, among a total of 125 nations that observe the jurisdiction of the ICC. The United States is not.
18 holes and diplomacy
Stubb won Trump’s ear on a golf round in West Palm Beach, Florida, in March, when they competed together in a membership tournament in one of Trump’s fields and Trump gave Stubb a new group of clubs to replace the Stubb set had brought with him.
According to the Wall Street Journal, Trump asked Stubb during lunch if he could trust Putin, and Stubb said “You can’t.” Hours later, said the Journal, Trump publicly criticized Putin for the first time for his refusal to accept a high fire with Ukraine.
The magazine also reported about informal calls and text messages since the two leaders since then, including Trump sometimes consulting Stubb before speaking with Putin. Zelenskyy also publicly thanked Stubb for helping him to build a connection with Trump after the Oval Office meeting infamously heated Trump and Zelenskyy in February.
Stubb also seems to have felt how to communicate with Trump the scope of the possible Putin land grabbing of the territory of Ukraine.
“For an American audience,” News told NBC, “the best way to explain it is that if you take the land mass of what Russia wants at this time from Ukraine, it would be a bit as if you were renouncing Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, even Virginia, and then crashing against Maryland.”
