R. Fico: what are the EU top officials doing at the Paris meeting on the issue of the deployment of foreign troops on the territory of Ukraine? This is an agenda with which the EU has nothing to do.

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Prime Minister Robert Fico spoke by telephone today with European Council President António Costa. He asked him why the President of the European Council, as the most important body of the EU, accepted an invitation to a meeting of seven EU Member States and the UK in Paris, where the issue of the presence of foreign troops on Ukrainian territory is being discussed as a security guarantee for Ukraine after the end of the war and the country's rejection of NATO membership. The participation of top EU officials (including the President of the European Commission) without any mandate in the Paris meeting is considered by Mr Fico to be an event that does not help confidence in the EU.

According to Fico, the EU does not have the power to decide on the presence of foreign troops on the territory of another state. This is only possible on the basis of a decision taken in the relevant UN bodies or on the basis of bilateral agreements between Ukraine and individual countries willing to send troops to its territory. Mr Fico therefore respects, without any objection, the meeting of states prepared to send troops to Ukraine. However, this is a subject with which the EU has nothing to do and should not comment on.

Mr Fico has repeatedly underlined his position. Firstly, that he will never agree to Ukraine's membership of NATO. This has been his long-standing and consistent position. Secondly, that Slovakia is not sending any armed forces to the territory of Ukraine.

The meeting in Paris was supposed to be secret. Its proceedings were revealed by a Polish official at the Munich conference. Mr Fico has long been an outspoken opponent of the continuation of the war in Ukraine. He has made it very clear that the West's strategy of using the war in Ukraine to weaken Russia has failed and that it has led to hundreds of thousands of casualties on both sides of the military conflict. Mr Fico has also stated publicly and repeatedly that Ukraine will lose part of its territory, will not be in NATO, will have its territory controlled by foreign armies and will still be prevented from joining the EU, which, incidentally, Slovakia supports wholeheartedly.

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