‘Too early’: Anthony Albanese makes his call on sending Aussie peacemakers to Ukraine
Australia’s prime minister is open to the concept of joining a “coalition of the willing” to support peacekeeping efforts in Ukraine. See what the opposition leader thinks.
National
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Anthony Albanese says Australia is open to joining a “coalition of the willing” to support peace in Ukraine, but it’s “too early” to make a call on putting boots on the ground in Europe.
The Prime Minister confirmed Australia will participate in a military-level meeting about the security situation to be held in Paris on Tuesday, but has yet agreed to send any troops to Ukraine in the event a peacekeeping mission is launched.
Mr Albanese spoke with UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer overnight on Saturday where he reiterated Australia “would consider” such a request in the future.
“It’s too early (to commit),” Mr Albanese said.
“You can’t have peacekeeping forces without having peace.”
A readout of the conversation from a Downing Street spokesman said Mr Starmer “welcomed” Mr Albanese’s “commitment to consider contributing to a coalition of the willing for Ukraine and looked forward to the chiefs of defence meeting in Paris”.
Meanwhile, Opposition leader Peter Dutton on Sunday said he believed basing Australian Defence Force personnel over in Europe at this time was the “wrong decision”.
“It’s unbelievable that the Prime Minister’s talking about moving troops from Australia to station them, or to base them in Ukraine, when Italy, Germany, France has made no decision yet to base troops there,” he said.
“There’s no peace yet, there’s no peace to keep.”
Mr Dutton said given he and Mr Albanese agreed it was the “most precarious period since the Second World War” then Australia should be “doing everything we can to bolster our security and our defences, and to make sure that we’re investing in, and not taking away from, the capacity of the Australian Defence Force”.
“My judgement is that to base troops in Europe at the moment is the wrong decision for our country,” he said.
Australia’s military representative to NATO, Air Vice Marshall Di Turton will take part in the talks in France, which will also be attended major European defence chiefs.
European countries have been scrambling to boost support for Ukraine as US President Donald Trump pursues direct talks with Russian leader Vladimir Putin to end Moscow’s three-year invasion of Ukraine.
Last week Mr Trump temporarily suspended the delivery of all US military aid to Ukraine just days after an explosive confrontation in the White House between the President and his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelensky.
Mr Trump later revealed he received a letter from Mr Zelensky in which the Ukrainian leader expressed willingness to come to the negotiating table over the Russia-Ukraine war.
“Ukraine is ready to come to the negotiating table as soon as possible to bring lasting peace closer. Nobody wants peace more than the Ukrainians,” Trump said in an address to Congress on Tuesday while quoting from the letter.
A Ukrainian delegation was due to meet with US diplomats for peace talks hosted in Saudi Arabia overnight.
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