Anand says Trump talks could be opportunity for allies to enact Ukraine security plan

OTTAWA — Foreign Affairs Minister Anita Anand says Trump’s talks with Russia and Ukraine could provide the opening for Ottawa and its peers to put plans into action to secure Kyiv’s future.

“There is an opportunity now to end Russia’s illegal war in Ukraine,” Anand said Tuesday during a press conference near Helsinki.

Anand said Canada and its peers have been talking about “stable security guarantees” for Ukraine since at least the July 2023 summit of the NATO military alliance.

Those talks morphed last fall into the Coalition of the Willing, a group of nations who have offered to help fund or staff a peacekeeping force on Ukrainian territory, including most European nations and others such as Canada, Japan and Australia.

“The work that the Coalition of the Willing is doing now is absolutely fundamental to adding the structure around the security guarantees, and in particular the obligations that each country will adhere to. But the commitment to a security guarantee has been present.”

The idea is to help Ukraine maintain its sovereignty and prevent more Russian incursions, after Moscow’s 2014 annexation of Crimea started the war, followed by the full-scale invasion in February 2022.

The issue of security guarantees loomed large Monday when U.S. President Donald Trump met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and European leaders at the White House, a few days after Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin met in Alaska.

Prime Minister Mark Carney took part in a virtual call Tuesday morning with the coalition to review the Monday meeting, says Canada’s readout.

“Leaders welcomed the openness of the United States to providing security guarantees to support long-term peace and security for Ukraine and Europe,” Carney’s office wrote.

“This approach is consistent with the principles of no decisions about Ukraine being taken without Ukraine, and no decisions about Europe being taken without Europe.”

Carney’s spokeswoman Audrey Champoux wrote that “Canada is automatically invited to COTW calls as a member of the coalition.” That is despite his calls with the coalition not being published on Carney’s itineraries nor confirmed to media ahead of time.

Champoux also said Canada’s absence at Friday’s meeting — which included countries like France and Italy who have contributed less aid to Ukraine than Canada — is because the meeting “was only for European leaders.”

Fen Hampson, a senior Carleton University professor of international affairs, said Monday that Canada’s “conspicuous” absence was likely because of Trump’s “particular dislike towards Canada.”

Also Tuesday, White House spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt said Trump will not have American soldiers on the ground, but says the U.S. is open to co-ordinating security for Ukraine and might provide air support.

“Both sides are going to have to walk away a little bit unhappy,” Leavitt said of the negotiations.

“He has scoffed at the ideas of others that have been raised, that we should wait another month before any meeting takes place. The president wants to move, and he wants to bring this war to an end as quickly as possible.”

Trump said Monday that he was pressing for three-way talks among Zelenskyy, Putin and himself. But after speaking to Putin later in the day, Trump said that he was arranging first for a face-to-face between Zelenskyy and Putin, and that three-way talks would follow if necessary.

“It was an idea that evolved in the course of the president’s conversations with both President Putin, President Zelensky and the European leaders yesterday,” Leavitt said.

The Kremlin has not yet said whether Putin has signed off on direct talks, but Leavitt said Tuesday that Putin promised Trump that he’ll meet directly with the Ukrainian leader.

— With files from The Associated Press.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Aug. 19, 2025.

Dylan Robertson, The Canadian Press