Who Sits at the Abu Dhabi Ukraine Talks? Europe’s Seat

Who gets a seat when Russia, Ukraine and the United States sit down in Abu Dhabi on 10 November? On Monday 9 November Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said the answer is three parties and nobody else. Within hours the European Union’s foreign policy chief, France’s foreign minister and Ukraine’s chief negotiator each said Europe would be there in some form.

Peskov said on 9 November that the Abu Dhabi talks are “a matter of trilateral negotiations”, which leaves no formal seat for the EU, France, Germany or the United Kingdom. Kaja Kallas, the EU’s High Representative for Foreign Affairs, said in Paris the same day that Russia has so far “just been pretending that they negotiate”. France’s foreign minister, Jean-Noël Barrot, said on 8 November that “France will be in Abu Dhabi”. Ukraine’s lead negotiator, Rustem Umerov, said European officials will hold “separate coordination” with his delegation. The dispute is over format, not only over substance. Whoever is in the room decides what “security guarantees” means.

Barrot, in an interview on Sunday 8 November, said “the Europeans will be well-represented, and France will be in Abu Dhabi”.

On Monday 9 November Peskov answered. He told reporters the talks are “a matter of trilateral negotiations”, meaning Russia, Ukraine and the United States as mediator. He added that the Americans and Ukrainians appear to be building their own coordination mechanism.

Kallas, speaking at the G7 foreign ministers’ meeting in Paris, said: “We have not seen any concrete signs from Russia indicating a willingness to negotiate in good faith.” She went further: “So far they have just been pretending that they negotiate because we haven’t seen any goodwill from the Russian side.” She asked for a ceasefire first, and said further American sanctions, coordinated with European ones, would have a “significantly greater” effect.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen put out a press statement the same day: “The EU will be present alongside our partners.” Umerov, heading Kyiv’s delegation, said European officials would hold “separate coordination” with the Ukrainians in Abu Dhabi, and that Italy would also be at the table.

The US side set its own tone. Jared Kushner, who mediates with Steve Witkoff, wrote on X on Monday: “We hope these discussions will identify areas of common ground, advance practical solutions.” Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said the same day that Donald Trump’s team has put “collective security” at the top of the agenda. Trump said in a television interview aired on Sunday that the sides are “very close” to a deal.

Peskov on Monday: “a matter of trilateral negotiations”. Zelensky on 6 November: European security “must be discussed with the participation of European nations”. Von der Leyen on Monday: “The EU will be present alongside our partners”. The three lines cannot all describe the same room. The Kremlin has drawn the table for three. Kyiv and Brussels answered with a second set of meetings beside it.

Kallas gave Europe’s reason for not trusting the three-way table. On Monday Ukraine’s air force said Russia launched 317 drones overnight, and Russia’s Defence Ministry said it hit four electrical substations in the Kyiv, Dnipropetrovsk, Cherkasy and Vinnytsia regions. Local officials said a strike on a warehouse of food for schools and kindergartens in Odesa killed three people. Ukraine struck the KINEF refinery near St Petersburg, according to the Leningrad governor, Alexander Drozdenko.

The agenda item Lavrov named, “collective security”, is a European subject. That is why the seat matters to Paris and Brussels: a text on guarantees written in Abu Dhabi would reach them as a finished proposal.

Whether the Kremlin’s delegation meets European officials at all in Abu Dhabi, or only the Americans and Ukrainians do. Whether the “collective security” item produces a text on European forces or guarantees, which Brussels would then have to accept or reject without having helped write it. Whether Washington and Brussels agree new sanctions after Kallas’s call for coordinated pressure. Whether Trump’s “very close” is matched by any Russian statement on a ceasefire before the talks end on 11 November.

For earlier context, see the Kremlin’s answer on Trump’s “big deal” and our pages on Ukraine and Kaja Kallas.