French Defense Minister Sebastien Lecornu said Thursday that France is sharing intelligence with Ukraine, a move that followed the United States saying it was cutting off intelligence-sharing with Ukraine.
The move comes as European Union leaders gathered Thursday in Brussels, along with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, for a summit to discuss boosting defense spending and bolstering pledges of support for Ukraine in its battle against Russia’s invasion.
French President Emmanuel Macron said ahead of the talks that EU members would "take decisive steps forward," while he expressed concerns about shifts in U.S. support for Ukraine under new President Donald Trump.
"The future of Europe does not have to be decided in Washington or Moscow," Macron said.
Trump earlier in the week ordered the U.S. to suspend military aid to Kyiv’s fighters after his contentious meeting last week with Zelenskyy at the White House.
CIA Director John Ratcliffe said Wednesday that the United States had also, for the moment, ended sharing its intelligence with Kyiv, although it could be short-lived after Zelenskyy said the exchanges with Trump in the Oval Office had been "regrettable" and that Ukraine was ready for peace talks with Russia.
"I think on the military front and the intelligence front, the pause [that prompted Ukraine's president to respond], I think will go away," Ratcliffe told the Fox Business Network.
"I think we'll work shoulder to shoulder with Ukraine as we have to push back on the aggression that's there, but to put the world in a better place for these peace negotiations to move forward," he said.
Since the start of the war in 2022, the United States has provided Ukraine with significant intelligence, including critical information its military needs for targeting Russian forces.
Mike Waltz, Trump’s national security adviser, told reporters Wednesday that the U.S. "had taken a step back" and that the administration was "reviewing all aspects" of its intelligence relationship with Ukraine.
Meanwhile, Waltz told CBS News that the U.S. is moving quickly to start peace negotiations to end the war and sign a mineral rights deal with Kyiv.
"I think we're going to see movement in very short order," Waltz said.
He said Trump officials will meet with Ukrainian officials as they conduct shuttle diplomacy with Russia.
"I have literally just been on the phone with my counterpart, the Ukrainian national security adviser, talking about times, locations, delegations," Waltz said.
Reaching a peace deal could prove difficult. Ukraine has long demanded a restoration of its internationally recognized 2014 borders before Moscow unilaterally seized Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula. Overall, Russia now holds about a fifth of Ukrainian territory, including much of eastern Ukraine, and has vowed to not return any of it to the Kyiv government.
Some information for this report came from The Associated Press, Agence France-Presse and Reuters.
