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Matviichuk highlighted that Ukraine is confronting not just Russia but an entire authoritarian bloc, including Iran, China, North Korea, and Syria. "Ukraine is not a goal. Ukraine is a tool how to break international order," she stated, underscoring that the conflict represents a broader challenge to global democratic values.
When asked about the future of US support, particularly in light of Donald Trump's re-election, she expressed uncertainty but affirmed Ukraine's resolve: "We don't know what will be the policy of the next president's administration, but what we know for sure is that Ukrainians will continue our fight for freedom. We have no other choice."
This conversation was presented by GZERO in partnership with Microsoft at the 7th annual Paris Peace Forum. The Global Stage series convenes global leaders for critical debates on the geopolitical and technological trends shaping our world.
Follow GZERO coverage of the Paris Peace Forum here: https://www.gzeromedia.com/global-stage
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A general view of the German lower house of parliament, in Berlin, Germany.
Under a plan agreed by Chancellor Olaf Scholz and the opposition, Europe’s largest economy is now headed toward early elections in February.
The move comes after weeks of fraying ties among the so-called “traffic light” coalition, an unwieldy tie-up of Scholz’s center-left Social Democrats (red), the business-friendly Free Democrats (yellow), and the environment-oriented Greens (you guessed it).
The final straw, last week, was a spat over Germany’s budget. Scholz and the Greens wanted to relax Germany’s strict fiscal rules to create room to invest in infrastructure, defense, and Ukraine aid. The Free Democrats rejected that and proposed a more austerity-oriented budget of their own. Scholz, in turn, sacked Free Democrat Finance Minister Christian Lindner, which led to his party leaving the governing coalition altogether.
What happens now: Under the current deal, Scholz will hold a confidence vote in his government in mid-December, which – assuming he loses as expected – will pave the way for February elections, which the parties want to hold on Feb. 23, 2025.
At the moment, polls show the opposition Christian Democratic Union as the clear frontrunner with 32% support, twice that of Scholz’s Social Democrats. The far-right Alternative For Germany polls second, at 17%.Russia's President Vladimir Putin and North Korea's leader Kim Jong Un attend a state reception in Pyongyang, North Korea, in June, 2024.
North Korea's state-controlled news agency KCNA announced on Tuesday that the country has ratified a strategic partnership agreement that allows Russia to use North Korean troops to help push Ukrainians from Russia’s Kursk region.
Ukrainian, US, NATO, and South Korean officials have warned in recent days that Russia has amassed a force of about 50,000 troops to try to evict Ukrainian forces from Russia’s Kursk and Belgorod regions – and they say the force includes 10,000-12,000 North Koreans.
The presence of North Korean soldiers could help Russia push forward with its offensive in Ukraine’s East. But beyond the ability of the North Koreans to draw Ukrainian fire away from Russian forces, it’s not clear how effective they will be on the battlefield. None of them has significant combat experience, and the Ukrainians they will be deployed to attack have been fighting in their country’s Donbas region for a decade.
In addition, throughout this war, Russian forces have faced command-and-control issues. It remains to be seen how Russian commanders can effectively coordinate real-time battlefield maneuvers with large numbers of non-Russian-speaking troops.
Russia's President Vladimir Putin talks to U.S. President Donald Trump during their bilateral meeting at the G20 summit in Hamburg, Germany July 7, 2017.
The Kremlin is denying reports that Donald Trump spoke with Russian President Vladimir Putin on the phone last Thursday. During the conversation, the US president-elect reportedly warned the Russian leader not to escalate the war in Ukraine while reminding him of the US military’s significant presence in Europe.
But Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov on Monday said such reports were “pure fiction,” while Trump’s team declined to comment on his “private calls” when questioned by the BBC.
This back-and-forth indicates how much attention is already focused on Trump’s potential approach to Ukraine. On the campaign trail, Trump expressed opposition to continued US support to Ukraine and said he would end the war in “24 hours,” without expanding on how he’d accomplish this.
Moving forward, there are open questions over the terms Trump expects both sides to negotiate under — and what he’d seek to use as leverage to get an agreement. Ukraine is heavily reliant on the US for everything from military aid to intelligence in this war, but it’s less clear what Trump can hang over Moscow to get a deal done and dusted.
Trump has reportedly suggested in private that Ukraine should give up territory to Russia — a prospect Kyiv has firmly rejected — in order to end the fighting. Even if a cease-fire was reached along these lines, it wouldn’t necessarily include a political agreement necessary for a lasting peace.
We’ll be watching for more signs of jockeying between Trump and both sides in this conflict ahead of his inauguration, which could give us a clearer picture of whether negotiations will occur and what they might look like.
The 2024 Paris Peace Forum faces a dysfunctional global order
The 7th annual Paris Peace Forum is getting underway, convening diplomats, academics, and private sector leaders tasked with finding solutions to mounting global crises before conflicts erupt. Spoiler alert: That mission has not been accomplished.
The Forum’s theme is “Wanted: A Functioning Global Order,” and will focus on topics such as the wars in Ukraine and the Middle East, funding for climate action, and countering disinformation and digital attacks to restore trust in cyberspace.
These conversations are particularly fraught following key political developments last week—Donald Trump’s clear victory in the US presidential election, and the collapse of German Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s coalition government following months of economic crisis. Both of those signal more unpredictable times to come for European politics.
GZERO’s Tony Maciulis is on the ground at the Paris Peace Forum for our Global Stage series, and interviewed Justin Vaisse, the organization’s founder and Director General. Top of mind for Vaisse, of course, was Trump’s election and what it means for Europe.
“I don’t think Trump will simply throw Ukraine under the bus,” Vaisse said. “The conclusion is still, however, that Europe should be ready to support Ukraine by itself. Whether it can is another question, but it should be ready.”
Check out Tony’s full interview with Justin Vaisse here, and look for more coverage of the Paris Peace Forum from GZERO this week.
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18: After 18 months of talks, the US and Mexico announced on Saturday that they have reached a new water-sharing agreement. The accord revises and makes more flexible a decades-old pact under which Mexico provides water from the Rio Grande to the US Southwest in exchange for water from the Colorado River. The breakthrough comes amid growing concerns about water scarcity on both sides of the border. (For more on the complicated (geo)politics of the Colorado River, see our report here).
84 and 145: Russia and Ukraine each launched their largest drone attacks ever against the other side this weekend. Moscow said it intercepted at least 84 Ukrainian drones, at least 34 of which were aimed at the capital city itself, while Kyiv said Russia had launched at least 145 unmanned craft of its own. Both sides said they shot down the majority of the other’s drones. The barrages come as both sides try to game out the impact of Trump 2.0, with the president-elect having pledged to end the war in “24 hours” when he returns to office.
500: The number of US students seeking to study abroad has spiked in the days since Donald Trump won the presidential election. A leading provider of information on foreign education opportunities reported that average inquiries jumped nearly 500% to 11,000 a day since last Tuesday night. College students were one of the few demographics that overwhelmingly supported Kamala Harris, with polls showing more than 70% favoring the vice president.
10 billion: Indonesia’s new president hailed cooperation with China, signing $10 billion in new business and security deals with the country at a forum in Beijing on Sunday. Prabowo Subianto, a former army general and businessman who took office last month, has praised China’s emergence as a “civilizational power” but also said Indonesia would remain “non-aligned.” His first trip abroad as president will take him from Beijing to Washington, DC, and then to South America and the UK.
6: Haiti’s interim Prime Minister Garry Conillewas fired on Sunday after just six months on the job. The country’s transitional council, established to restore democratic order amid increasing gang violence, signed a decree to dismiss Conille, replacing him with businessman Alix Didier Fils-Aimé, the former president of Haiti’s Chamber of Commerce and Industry. The decree is set to be published on Monday.
Carl Bildt, former prime minister of Sweden and co-chair of the European Council on Foreign Relations, shares his perspective on European politics from Stockholm, Sweden.
What does Germany's coalition collapse mean for Chancellor Scholz, the country, and Europe as a whole? Well, the collapse of the coalition government was, to some extent, expected. There had been speculations for weeks on how long it was going to hold together, and finally, the Chancellor himself pulled the plug in a rather vicious personal attack against the finance minister. Then he sacked him and then the government went up in flames. Now, what he wants to do is strangely enough to stay in power until January 15th and vote for the confidence, lose vote the confidence in parliament then, and have elections in March. I doubt that will be the case. I think there is now very heavy pressure by the opposition, needless to say.There's pressure by business, there are pressure by others saying that we can't have this uncertainty going on for months and months, particularly in a situation where other things are happening in the world, mildly speaking. So I wouldn't be surprised if we have, for example, a vote of confidence or he has to put himself a vote of confidence by mid-next week or something like that, and Germany is heading for election perhaps very early next year. Then of course, the other question will arise, what kind of government could possibly arise out of that particular election? That's a later, somewhat complicated issue. I guess we will have reason to return to it.