Finnish foreign minister: Peace deal with Russia remains far off
"I have little confidence that [Russian President Vladimir] Putin would stick to a US peace plan," she told Germany's Redaktionsnetzwerk Deutschland (RND) media group in comments published in German.
"After everything the Russians have done in the last 15 years, the way they are still attacking Ukraine today and waging a perfidious hybrid war against Europe, peace with Russia is a long way off," the Finnish minister said.
Valtonen continued, "As long as Moscow continues to focus on the war economy and pursue political goals that go far beyond Ukraine, we cannot limit negotiations to Ukraine and cannot trust the Russians."
Russia in its current form is a threat, not only to Ukraine and the whole of Europe, but to the entire trans-Atlantic alliance, she said.
"Every peace plan is currently failing because of Russian President Vladimir Putin. With his words and actions, he makes it clear every day that he does not want peace," she told RND.
The Finnish foreign minister called for European allies to have a seat at the table during negotiations.
"On this important issue, it is even more urgent than ever to speak plainly with our partners in the US. [US President Donald] Trump and his team must understand that the negotiations with Russia are not just about Ukraine, but about the security architecture of Europe as a whole," she said.
Hashtags

Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles


New York Times
23 minutes ago
- New York Times
Trump, Obama and the Question of Treason
President Trump believes that President Barack Obama committed treason, a crime that may be punishable by death. Seeking a distraction from his current political travails, Mr. Trump is attempting to relitigate the nearly decade-old controversy over Russian involvement in the 2016 election. Mr. Trump is wrong on the facts and the law, and his sensational allegation serves only to demonstrate how completely he has degraded contemporary political discourse. Mr. Trump denounced Mr. Obama after Tulsi Gabbard, the director of national intelligence, asked the Justice Department to investigate whether intelligence officials in the Obama administration faked evidence of Russian efforts to influence the 2016 election. When the question of who should be targeted in the investigation was posed at an Oval Office press availability, Mr. Trump said: 'It would be President Obama. He started it. … This was treason. This was every word you can think of. They tried to steal the election. They tried to obfuscate the election. They did things that nobody's ever even imagined, even in other countries.' Mr. Trump also mentioned former President Joe Biden, former F.B.I. Director James Comey, the former director of national intelligence James Clapper and former C.I.A. Director John Brennan as other possible defendants. President Trump's history of intemperate remarks has earned him a perverse kind of immunity; the more outrageous his statement, the faster it is often dismissed. But Mr. Trump doesn't deserve this bloviator's privilege. He's not just the president, but, more to the point, he's the overseer of an unusually compliant Justice Department, and his offhand condemnation of his predecessor is as significant as it is chilling. Indeed, Mr. Trump made sure that the investigation of purported treason swiftly took on a life of its own. Attorney General Pam Bondi announced that a Justice Department 'strike force' would investigate the allegations against Mr. Obama and the others, and a pair of Republican senators, Lindsey Graham and John Cornyn, have called for the appointment of a special counsel to lead the inquiry. Treason is the only crime defined in the Constitution, and it's set out there, in relevant part, as giving 'aid and comfort' to our enemies. Regurgitating a claim that Mr. Trump and his allies have made for years, Ms. Gabbard said that President Obama, after Hillary Clinton was defeated by President Trump in the 2016 election, 'directed the creation of an intelligence community assessment that they knew was false.' Want all of The Times? Subscribe.


Newsweek
an hour ago
- Newsweek
Putin Loses Influence in Backyard
Based on facts, either observed and verified firsthand by the reporter, or reported and verified from knowledgeable sources. Newsweek AI is in beta. Translations may contain inaccuracies—please refer to the original content. His absence from World War II commemorations in Moscow was enough of a snub to Vladimir Putin, but Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev deepened his rift with the Russian leader by demanding Russia take responsibility for an air tragedy. Baku blames the Christmas Day crash of Azerbaijan Airlines Flight 8243 that came under fire over Grozny, Chechnya—killing 38 of the 67 on board—on a Russian Pantsir-S1 air defense system mistakenly targeting the plane amid a reported Ukrainian drone attack. Unhappy with Putin's lack of apology, Aliyev reiterated on Monday his demand for Russia to publicly acknowledge responsibility, punish those responsible, and compensate victims' families and the airline. But it is not just the plane crash that has frayed ties—tit-for-tat arrests and discontent from Baku toward Moscow's regional role as Putin remains preoccupied in Ukraine have also played their part. Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev, left, is seen with Russian President Vladimir Putin at the BRICS summit in Kazan, Russia, on October 23, 2024. Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev, left, is seen with Russian President Vladimir Putin at the BRICS summit in Kazan, Russia, on October 23, regional expert told Newsweek that ties between Azerbaijan and Russia are at their lowest point since the end of the Soviet Union. Another said Aliyev sees his country as the key shaper of the region now rather than Moscow. Ali Karimli, leader of Azerbaijan's democratic opposition, told Newsweek Aliyev had distanced himself from Moscow following the fall of Putin's ally, Bashar al-Assad in Syria, which signaled a weakening of Russian strength in the wider region. Aliyev "began to realize that Russia was not as powerful as once assumed," he said. Newsweek has contacted the foreign ministries in Russia and Azerbaijan for comment. Baku's Harsh Reaction With a shared Soviet past, fossil-fuel dominated economies and authoritarian leaders, Russia and Azerbaijan have much in common. But Moscow's invasion of Ukraine has upended Russia's regional role and Aliyev has spotted an opportunity to capitalize on Putin's tepid response to a tragic plane crash. Half a year later, tensions between the countries spilled over again following the arrests in June of dozens of Azerbaijanis in the Russian city of Yekaterinburg. The Azerbaijanis, all Russian citizens, were taken into custody in a raid as part of an inquiry into cold case murders over the previous two decades. Those detained were beaten, and two brothers—the main suspects died. Azerbaijani authorities accused Russian security forces of deliberately killing their nationals. Russian cultural events in Azerbaijan were canceled, and the Baku office of the Kremlin's Sputnik news agency was raided and its employees detained. "Russia didn't expect such a harsh reaction from Baku," Konul de Moor, International Crisis Group's consulting South Caucasus analyst, told Newsweek. "Their relationship is the lowest it has ever been since Azerbaijan gained its independence." Karimli, leader of the Azerbaijan Popular Front Party and a former secretary of state whose opposition to Aliyev's rule has seen him face a travel ban and refused a passport by his country's authorities, told Newsweek the crash of Flight 8243 occurred when Aliyev was already pulling away from Moscow. At the onset of Russia's full-scale war against Ukraine, Aliyev believed Moscow would win quickly and reestablish its dominance across the post-Soviet space. On February 22, 2022— two days before the invasion—Aliyev signed a declaration in Moscow with Putin affirming a bilateral alliance between Azerbaijan and Russia. But as the war dragged on and Russia suffered repeated strategic losses, Aliyev, like many others, began to realize that Russia was not as powerful as once assumed, and was in fact becoming weaker, Karimli said. The downfall of the Assad regime in Syria further convinced Aliyev of this decline—Russia had failed to protect one of its most valued allies, he said. Aliyev also observed how Turkey and the West were rapidly filling the vacuum left by Russia's retreat, not only in Syria but across the wider region. "While Putin saw Assad's fall as a major loss, Aliyev appeared to welcome the outcome and publicly described Assad's removal as a positive development—deliberately signaling political distance from Moscow," said Karimli. "He seemed to conclude that close association with Russia might actually be more dangerous than opposing it." Ali Karimli, Azerbaijan's former secretary of state and chairman of the democratic opposition Azerbaijan Popular Front Party, is seen in this undated image. Ali Karimli, Azerbaijan's former secretary of state and chairman of the democratic opposition Azerbaijan Popular Front Party, is seen in this undated image. Supplied Nagorno-Karabakh Withdrawal Before Assad's downfall, there had already been a shift in Russia's authority in the South Caucasus, an area Moscow considers its backyard. Russian peacekeepers deployed to Nagorno-Karabakh after the 2020 Armenian-Azerbaijani war put up no resistance to Baku's blockade of the region. A Russian peacekeeping contingent left the region in 2024 ahead of schedule after not intervening in Baku's successful military operation to take full control of Nagorno-Karabakh from its separatist Armenian authorities in September 2023. Stefan Meister, head of the center for order and governance in Eastern Europe, Russia, and Central Asia at the German Council on Foreign Relations, told Newsweek that Azerbaijan winning the Second Nagorno-Karabakh War and taking over the region prompted Aliyev to see Baku as a regional player Moscow can no longer dictate to. "Aliyev considers himself as the key shaper of the new regional security order, where Russia will not play the role it played in the past," he said. "Azerbaijan is not willing to accept compromises with Russia." This comes as Moscow faces a souring of ties with another regional neighbor. Armenia did not attend the latest summit of the Moscow-led Collective Security Treaty Organization, angered by the lack of solidarity from Russia when Baku captured Nagorno-Karabakh, an operation which Meister said emboldened Aliyev's attitude to Moscow. "Aliyev did what he did without getting punished by Russia," said Meister. "He saw the relative weakness of Moscow and the unwillingness also to go into conflict with Azerbaijan because Moscow needs them." Aliyev and Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan met in Abu Dhabi on July 10 for the first unmediated bilateral contact between the two leaders. It comes after Armenian prosecutors accused Moscow of trying to overthrow Yerevan's pro-Western government in 2024 in an alleged plot disrupted by local security forces. Armenia has since accelerated its policy of EU integration and distanced itself from the Moscow-led CSTO military alliance. Emergency specialists work at the site where Azerbaijan Airlines Flight 8243 crashed, near the western Kazakh city of Aktau, on December 25, 2024. Emergency specialists work at the site where Azerbaijan Airlines Flight 8243 crashed, near the western Kazakh city of Aktau, on December 25, with no free press, no functioning civil society, and the political opposition repressed, Azerbaijan is unlike Armenia, said Karimli adding that Aliyev may resist being in hock to Russia but he is equally unwilling to open up to the West. Azerbaijan may be strategically important to Russia but the reverse is also true with Russia a key partner for Aliyev, who understands that breaking with Putin would force him to deepen ties with Europe and the United States—something he is reluctant to do, given his wish to resist democratic reforms and preserve his authoritarian grip, Karimli added. "If Putin were to break with Aliyev, he would effectively lose his last remaining ally in the South Caucasus," he said. Putin also cannot overlook Baku's strategic alliance with Turkey and pushing Russia's relationship with Azerbaijan to breaking point could strain Moscow's ties with Ankara—something the Kremlin can ill afford under current geopolitical conditions, he added. Trade relations between Moscow and Baku are still strong, as is a mutual dependency on energy exports. Linguistic ties are also tight with Russian still widely spoken in Azerbaijan and nearly half (46 percent) of the total volume of remittances paid to Azerbaijan come from Russia, where, according to official data, more than 300,000 Azerbaijanis live. But Aliyev can also benefit from portraying Azerbaijan as a strategic partner of the West in the global confrontation with Russia, especially in the energy sector. "He has a better partnering position and it's more difficult for Russia to punish Aliyev or to escalate their relations too far," said Meister. Pushing back against Russia is a good card for Azerbaijan to play with the West, de Moor said, with the prospect of investment as Baku eyes energy-related projects bypassing Russia . All this marks a shift in the position of Russia in the South Caucasus. "Russia can't treat it as its near abroad any more," added de Moor.
Yahoo
2 hours ago
- Yahoo
Thousands flee as fighting between Thailand and Cambodia continues
Tens of thousands of people sought refuge on Friday as border fighting between Thailand and Cambodia entered a second day, heightening fears of a broader conflict. The UN Security Council is scheduled to hold an emergency meeting on the crisis later on Friday in New York, while Malaysia, which chairs a regional bloc that includes both countries, called for an end to hostilities and offered to mediate. The Health Ministry on Friday said more than 58,000 have fled from villages to temporary shelters in four affected Thai border provinces, while Cambodian authorities said more than 4,000 people have evacuated from areas near the border. The fighting has killed at least 14 people in Thailand, while Cambodia confirmed its first fatality on Friday. Tensions over a disputed border area erupted into fighting after a land mine explosion along the border wounded five Thai soldiers on Wednesday. The Thai military reported clashes early on Friday in multiple areas, including along the border at Chong Bok and Phu Makhuea in Thailand's Ubon Ratchathani province; at Phanom Dong Rak in Surin province; and near the ancient Ta Muen Thom temple. Associated Press reporters near the border could hear the sounds of artillery from early morning hours. The Thai army said Cambodian forces had used heavy artillery and Russian-made BM-21 rocket launchers, prompting what Thai officials described as 'appropriate supporting fire' in return. Thailand said one soldier and 13 civilians were killed, including children, while 15 soldiers and 30 civilians were wounded. Cambodia's chief official in Oddar Meanchey province, General Khov Ly, said a man died instantly on Thursday after a Thai rocket hit a Buddhist pagoda where he was hiding. At least four civilians were also wounded in Thursday's fighting there. As the fighting intensified, villagers on both sides have been caught in the crossfire, leading many to flee. About 600 people took shelter at a gymnasium in a university in Surin, Thailand, about 50 miles from the border. Evacuees sat in groups, on mats and blankets, and queued for food and drinks. Across the border in Cambodia, villages on the outskirts of Oddar Meanchey province were largely deserted. Homes stood locked, while chickens and dogs roamed outside. Some villagers earlier dug holes to create makeshift underground bunkers, covering them with wood, tarpaulin and zinc sheets to shield themselves from shelling. Families with children were seen packing their belongings on home-made tractors to evacuate, though a few men refused to leave. Solve the daily Crossword