The leaders of Finland and Norway made a rare phone call to President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia on Tuesday as part of the ongoing efforts to end the war in Ukraine.
As President Trump has tilted more toward Russia in recent days, casting doubt on Ukraine’s president and agreeing to buy diesel from Russia, European leaders have tried to step into the peace process to assure European interests are taken into account and protect Ukraine from being steamrolled.
According to the Norwegian government, the purpose of the call was “to convey messages directly to President Putin regarding future negotiations to help to end the war.” The call was supposed to last 20 minutes but ran for 90 and was an extension of a high-level meeting last week in Oslo. More meetings on the Ukraine war are scheduled next month in Abu Dhabi.
But not all European leaders were happy about the phone call. It immediately reopened a sore subject: Who should be the one to talk to Mr. Putin?
“I am very skeptical about this Norwegian and Finnish initiative,” said Mette Frederiksen, Denmark’s prime minister. “It is not coordinated with the rest of us.”
She said that she couldn’t see “any signs that Russia wants peace” and that “we should keep Europe together instead of going solo.”
Sweden’s prime minister, Ulf Kristersson, piled onto the criticism.
“Holding talks that risk dividing a united European voice is risky,” he said.
He added, “I’m not saying they have done that at all. I don’t yet know what those talks were about.”
Europe has been flailing to find a way into the Ukraine peace process. The war has been grinding on for almost five years, costing hundreds of thousands of lives. And the consensus is growing that Mr. Trump is too pro-Russian and not a reliable mediator to bring it to a just end.
Mr. Trump recently insisted that Ukraine “get a new president” and he continues to shift his position in favor of Russia. Earlier this month, he opened the doors for the United States to buy billions of dollars of Russian diesel, which European countries and Ukraine especially saw as a boost for the Russian war machine. Mr. Trump also recently used a crude word to refer to Norway, one of the most developed nations on the planet.
