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Keir Starmer, left, and Emmanuel Macron, in Paris on Monday before the Armistice events Photograph: Aurélien Morissard/AP
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Defence secretary John Healey welcomes report saying Trump has warned Russia against escalation in Ukraine
Good morning. Keir Starmer is in Paris this morning for talks with the French president, Emmanuel Macron. The prime minister is visiting to attend the French Armistice Day service, but the real interest will lie in what the leaders of Europe’s two biggest military powers have to say as they discuss the implications of Donald Trump’s victory in the US presidential election.
Here is Jessica Elgot’s overnight preview story.
John Healey, the defence secretary, has been doing a media round this morning. Quite what Trump will do about Ukraine – in fact, about anything – remains uncertain, but in the US it is being reported that Trump has spoken to Vladimir Putin, the Russian president, and urged him not to escalate the Russian offensive in Ukraine. In her story Maya Yang reports:
Donald Trump spoke on the phone with Vladimir Putin on Thursday and discussed the war in Ukraine, the Washington Post reported on Sunday, citing people familiar with the matter.
The US president-elect advised the Russian president not to escalate the war in Ukraine and reminded him of “Washington’s sizeable military presence in Europe”, the Post reported.
It added that Trump expressed interest in follow-up conversations on “the resolution of Ukraine’s war soon”.
During the election campaign, Trump said he would find a solution to end the war “within a day”, but did not explain how he would do so.
According to one former US official who was familiar with the call and spoke to the Washington Post, Trump likely does not want to begin his second presidential term with an escalation in the Ukraine war, “giving him incentive to want to keep the war from worsening”.
In an interview on the Today programme, Healey welcomed this report. Asked if Ukraine was losing the war, he replied:
Ukraine is certainly under pressure. Russia is certainly escalating, and President Trump has reportedly told Putin and warned him against further escalation. If he’s done that, he’s right to do so.
Russia is escalating with massing North Korean troops on their territory. It’s escalating with more than 2,000 one-way attack kamikaze drones aimed at Kyiv and the rest of the Ukrainian cities in the last month alone. And one person is responsible for that escalation, and that’s Putin.
I will post more from Healey’s interviews shortly.
Here is the agenda for the day.
Morning: Keir Starmer is meeting Emmanuel Macron, the French president, in Paris.
10am: Jonathan Reynolds, the business secretary, gives evidence to the Post Office Horizon inquiry. He will be followed by Kemi Badenoch, the Conservative leader, giving evidence in her capacity as Reynolds’ predecessor as business secretary. Her evidence may continue into the afternoon.
11.30am: Downing Street holds a lobby briefing.
2.30pm: Liz Kendall, the work and pensions secretary, takes questions in the Commons.
Afternoon: Starmer is expected to speak to journalists while flying from Paris to Baku, where he is attending the Cop29 summit.
If you want to contact me, please post a message below the line or message me on social media. I can’t read all the messages BTL, but if you put “Andrew” in a message aimed at me, I am more likely to see it because I search for posts containing that word.
If you want to flag something up urgently, it is best to use social media. I’m still using X and I’ll see something addressed to @AndrewSparrow very quickly. I’m also trying Bluesky (@andrewsparrowgdn) and Threads (@andrewsparrowtheguardian).
I find it very helpful when readers point out mistakes, even minor typos. No error is too small to correct. And I find your questions very interesting too. I can’t promise to reply to them all, but I will try to reply to as many as I can, either BTL or sometimes in the blog.
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Healey says he does not expect US to turn away from Nato under Trump
In his interviews this morning John Healey, the defence secretary, was generally talking down the risk that Donald Trump’s re-election poses to Ukraine rather than talking it up. But perhaps his most accurate answer came when he we will just have to “wait and see” what happens. Here is a summary of the main lines from his interviews on this topic.
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Healey said he did not expect the US to turn away from Nato under Trump. He told Sky News:
I don’t expect the US to turn away from Nato. They recognise the importance of the alliance. They recognise the importance of avoiding further conflict in Europe.
Healey said US support for Nato “goes back decades, and that has remained, including through the previous President Trump administration”. He also said Trump had “rightly” pushed for European nations to spend more on defence.
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Healey said he expected the US under Trump to stand by Ukraine for “as long as it takes to prevail”. Asked if Trump’s win made Ukraine less safe, he told Sky News:
No, I don’t. The US alongside the UK have been two of the leading countries that have been standing by Ukraine, supporting Ukraine, our determination to do so is just as strong.
As far as President Trump goes, he recognises that countries get security through strength, just as alliances like Nato do, and I expect the US to remain alongside allies like the UK, standing with Ukraine for as long as it takes to prevail over Putin’s invasion.
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But Healey also said the world would have to “wait and see” what Trump would do over Ukraine. He told BBC Breakfast:
We’ll have to wait and see what President Trump really proposes … but if the reports of his call with [Vladimir] Putin last week are right then President Trump is exactly right to warn Putin against escalation of the conflict in Ukraine.
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Healey said Keir Starmer and President Macron would be discussing this morning what “more” they can do to support Ukraine.
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Healey said it was for Ukraine to decide when it starts talking to Russia about peace. He said:
It’s Ukraine that gets to call when the talking starts. Our job is to support Ukraine, stand by them when they fight, stand by them if they decide to talk.
This could be ended today if Putin withdrew following his illegal invasion … that’s the way this conflict could be ended, and the importance for us for Europe and for the United States is that Putin in the long run does not prevail, because if he does prevail, he will not stop at Ukraine, and the cost to us all will be much greater in the future.
Healey claims it is 'simply not correct' to say UK's relationship with Ukraine has got worse since Labour took office
On Saturday the Guardian ran a story saying that officials in Kyiv are complaining in private about the UK’s refusal to supply them with more Storm Shadow missiles and saying the relationship with London has “got worse” since Labour took office.
On the Today programme John Healey, the defence secretary, claimed the report was “simply not correct”. Asked if the relationship had got worse, Healey replied:
That is simply not correct. We’ve stepped up with more military support. We’ve speeded up deliveries. We’re now spending more on military aid for Ukraine than ever before as a UK government.
I spoke at length to the defence minister in Ukraine yesterday. He certainly doesn’t see the UK support weakening, and he said the Ukrainians are confident in Britain’s continuing and steadfast support for their country.
Michel Barnier welcomes Starmer to Paris, and pays tribute to Franco-British friendship
Keir Starmer has met Michel Barnier, the French prime minister, in Paris this morning. They know each other well, from when Starmer was shadow Brexit secretary and Barnier was the EU’s chief Brexit negotiator, and Barner says he was “tres heureux” to meet his old interlocutor.
And here’s a translation (mostly from Google, but with my version of “vient de loin, a connu les épreuves”, because Google’s wasn’t very good.)
Very happy to see you again, @Keir_Starmer, in Paris this morning.
Franco-British friendship has come a long way, through thick and thin. It will be invaluable in facing the challenges that lie ahead.
Thank you, Mr. Prime Minister, @10DowningStreet, for being with the French people on this November 11.
(The tone of Barnier’s message may upset some Brexiters. They still regard him as the devil incarnate, and seeing him being so friendly about Starmer may revive their suspicions about the PM’s Europhilia.)
Defence secretary John Healey welcomes report saying Trump has warned Russia against escalation in Ukraine
Good morning. Keir Starmer is in Paris this morning for talks with the French president, Emmanuel Macron. The prime minister is visiting to attend the French Armistice Day service, but the real interest will lie in what the leaders of Europe’s two biggest military powers have to say as they discuss the implications of Donald Trump’s victory in the US presidential election.
Here is Jessica Elgot’s overnight preview story.
John Healey, the defence secretary, has been doing a media round this morning. Quite what Trump will do about Ukraine – in fact, about anything – remains uncertain, but in the US it is being reported that Trump has spoken to Vladimir Putin, the Russian president, and urged him not to escalate the Russian offensive in Ukraine. In her story Maya Yang reports:
Donald Trump spoke on the phone with Vladimir Putin on Thursday and discussed the war in Ukraine, the Washington Post reported on Sunday, citing people familiar with the matter.
The US president-elect advised the Russian president not to escalate the war in Ukraine and reminded him of “Washington’s sizeable military presence in Europe”, the Post reported.
It added that Trump expressed interest in follow-up conversations on “the resolution of Ukraine’s war soon”.
During the election campaign, Trump said he would find a solution to end the war “within a day”, but did not explain how he would do so.
According to one former US official who was familiar with the call and spoke to the Washington Post, Trump likely does not want to begin his second presidential term with an escalation in the Ukraine war, “giving him incentive to want to keep the war from worsening”.
In an interview on the Today programme, Healey welcomed this report. Asked if Ukraine was losing the war, he replied:
Ukraine is certainly under pressure. Russia is certainly escalating, and President Trump has reportedly told Putin and warned him against further escalation. If he’s done that, he’s right to do so.
Russia is escalating with massing North Korean troops on their territory. It’s escalating with more than 2,000 one-way attack kamikaze drones aimed at Kyiv and the rest of the Ukrainian cities in the last month alone. And one person is responsible for that escalation, and that’s Putin.
I will post more from Healey’s interviews shortly.
Here is the agenda for the day.
Morning: Keir Starmer is meeting Emmanuel Macron, the French president, in Paris.
10am: Jonathan Reynolds, the business secretary, gives evidence to the Post Office Horizon inquiry. He will be followed by Kemi Badenoch, the Conservative leader, giving evidence in her capacity as Reynolds’ predecessor as business secretary. Her evidence may continue into the afternoon.
11.30am: Downing Street holds a lobby briefing.
2.30pm: Liz Kendall, the work and pensions secretary, takes questions in the Commons.
Afternoon: Starmer is expected to speak to journalists while flying from Paris to Baku, where he is attending the Cop29 summit.
If you want to contact me, please post a message below the line or message me on social media. I can’t read all the messages BTL, but if you put “Andrew” in a message aimed at me, I am more likely to see it because I search for posts containing that word.
If you want to flag something up urgently, it is best to use social media. I’m still using X and I’ll see something addressed to @AndrewSparrow very quickly. I’m also trying Bluesky (@andrewsparrowgdn) and Threads (@andrewsparrowtheguardian).
I find it very helpful when readers point out mistakes, even minor typos. No error is too small to correct. And I find your questions very interesting too. I can’t promise to reply to them all, but I will try to reply to as many as I can, either BTL or sometimes in the blog.
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