ČRo Plus: When there is a ceasefire, let's create a coalition of the willing for Ukraine, says Pavel Žáček

PRAGUE - (ČRo Plus) Several European countries have already expressed their determination to send troops to Ukraine to monitor a possible ceasefire. Poland, for example, has not done so, arguing that troops from directly neighbouring countries should not go to Ukraine. "When we know all the parameters, there will be nothing else left," Pavel Žáček, chairman of the parliamentary committee on security, told CRo Plus in Pro and Con.

You can listen to the whole debate with Pavel Žáček on ČRo Plus.

Should the Czech Republic offer its soldiers to the peacekeeping mission in Ukraine?

We don't know all the parameters yet. They will be known only after the Trump administration succeeds in concluding a ceasefire in Ukraine. And Trump will push his European partners to take care of the ceasefire, obviously leaving it up to Europe.

After that, we will have to build a coalition of the willing to enter Ukraine, to help maintain the ceasefire, to keep the peace, to create space for further negotiations and perhaps to end the war.

But for that we need to know all the parameters - what will be the logistics, what will be the intelligence background, what will be the security of the whole event, what will be the air defence, what will be the mandate, how should the soldiers defend themselves.

I can't imagine ending this war without doing so. But for us as the Czech Republic it will be absolutely crucial what the parameters will be, what the assignment will be, what the mandate will be. It will certainly not be NATO.

So it just depends on the conditions. But basically you are saying, yes, the Czech Republic should provide its troops for such a mission if it has the appropriate parameters?

Trump is already saying US troops won't go there. But we need to have that background. We don't have the logistics that the U.S. military has globally. We don't have that intelligence coverage, although I'm sure the British have some capability, we can't do it without them. But they won't be on the ground, as I understand it today, unless the mood in the White House changes.

So we'll have to decide. And the pressure will be both from the American side and, I believe, from the European side. If Trump says that Europe has to go there, then it can't just be the UK and France.

So you're saying the Czechs too?

Once we know all the parameters, I don't think we'll be left with anything else.

PhDr. Pavel Žáček, Ph.D.

Member of the Czech Republic
Chairman of the Security Committee of the Parliamentary Assembly
founder and first director of the Institute for the Study of Totalitarian Regimes and the Security Forces Archive

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