Lorenzo Maria Pacini
A Europe that wants to return to the negotiating table will first have to change its vocabulary.
A Europe that invites itself is a rude Europe
There's a saying that's been circulating in diplomatic circles for some time: whoever isn't seated at the table ends up on the menu.
In Abu Dhabi, on November 10 and 11, 2026, the formula was turned on its head. Europe wasn't invited to the table because it was already on the menu. In the Emirates, discussions centered on territories, security guarantees, prisoners, and - for the first time explicitly - the security architecture of the European continent. The courses were European. The diners were not.
The fourth round of trilateral talks mediated by the United States - the first since the Geneva meeting in February - brought together Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff for Washington, Vladimir Medinsky and GRU chief Igor Kostyukov for Moscow, and Rustem Umerov for Kyiv. The national security advisers from France, Germany, the United Kingdom, and Italy, along with representatives from NATO and the European Commission, were also in the United Arab Emirates, but in the next room. Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov had made clear the day before that "trilateral negotiations between Russia and Ukraine, mediated by the United States," would take place in Abu Dhabi. The outcome of the two-day meeting is meager in substantive terms, with an agreement in principle on a prisoner exchange and no breakthrough on a ceasefire or territorial issues. Symbolically, however, it speaks volumes.
The sequence of events in the preceding days speaks louder than the final statements. Ursula von der Leyen had announced that the EU would participate in the talks "with our partners," and Moscow denied this within a few hours. French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot had assured that France would be present to make Europe's voice heard. On October 27, Finnish President Alexander Stubb and Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre had telephoned Vladimir Putin, though they made it clear they were acting in their national capacities and not on behalf of the EU. Peskov drew the harshest conclusion from this: Europe cannot even decide who should speak for it.
A party that shows up at negotiations without an invitation, without a unified mandate, and without a proposal of its own is not a negotiating partner. It is a supplicant. Behind closed doors, Medinsky publicly asked in what capacity the Europeans were in Abu Dhabi, adding that he had not received any concrete proposals from them. The question was rhetorical; so was the answer.
The price of rhetoric
This exclusion did not originate in the Emirates. It is the culmination of more than four and a half years of choices - rhetorical even before they were political - that have transformed European leaders from potential mediators into declared co-belligerents, yet lacking the means and the mandate to truly be so. In April 2022, High Representative Josep Borrell stated that the war would be won on the battlefield. In February 2024, Emmanuel Macron argued that sending Western troops to Ukraine could not be ruled out. In March 2025, the Commission launched the "ReArm Europe" plan, with a mobilization target of nearly 800 billion euros. Six months later, Chancellor Friedrich Merz explained that Europe was not at war with Russia, but was no longer even at peace.
For years, the Union's official lexicon revolved around a few words: aggression, strategic defeat, war economy, existential threat. One could debate at length whether each of these phrases had a moral foundation. In diplomacy, however, credibility depends on consistency between what is said and what is demanded. Those who have proclaimed for years that they want to inflict a strategic defeat on their adversary cannot, on the day negotiations begin, present themselves as impartial guarantors. Moscow's assessment came promptly: so far, the Europeans have acted as disruptive elements in the process. Sergey Lavrov added, with his customary sarcasm, that the European mediators might as well stay in their hotels.
European foreign ministries have never opened an independent diplomatic channel with Moscow worthy of the name. They delegated the management of the war to Washington and are now discovering that they have also delegated the management of peace. In this sense, their exclusion is not an injustice suffered. It is a consequence they have brought upon themselves.
It would be convenient to place all the blame on the Kremlin. However, American statements must be read in conjunction with their actions. In words, Washington went out of its way for the Europeans: Witkoff outlined the goal of moving toward broader multilateral talks involving European partners, and Secretary of State Marco Rubio was repeatedly told by EU foreign ministers that Europe must have a say in any agreement. In reality, the U.S. delegation accepted the three-party format desired by Moscow, met with the Europeans only in separate consultations before the talks began, and left them out of the meeting room on both days. The day after the talks, Kushner and Witkoff left for Moscow, tasked with asking Putin for the green light for European participation in the next round.
This detail is crucial. The American delegates effectively confirmed the exclusion of the Europeans from this phase of the negotiations and turned their potential inclusion into a concession to be wrested from the Kremlin. Europe's seat at the table has become a bargaining chip between Washington and Moscow: the two powers negotiating the continent's future also decide whether, when, and under what conditions the Europeans will be allowed to sit alongside them. Kushner admitted as much in his own way, noting that an agreement can only be reached with the Europeans by their side. By their side, precisely. Not at the center.
Delegitimization as a strategy
What does all this mean ? Soft power is the ability to achieve one's goals through attraction and legitimacy rather than coercion, but there is also the flip side of that ability: stripping an actor of legitimacy without physically touching them, simply by exposing them for what they are. The image of European advisors confined to the next room carries more weight than any press release. It is a communicative act aimed first and foremost at European citizens, to whom it is clearly stated that their leaders do not matter.
Moscow and Washington pursue this outcome for different but converging reasons. Russia needs to demonstrate that it deals as an equal with the only power it considers a partner, bypassing a Union it deems hostile and fragmented. The United States needs a Europe that finances reconstruction, takes responsibility for future regional security, and purchases weapons - without, however, having a seat at the decision-making table. In both cases, the delegitimization of European leadership comes in handy. And here, soft power works almost on its own: all it takes is letting the photograph circulate.
The most uncomfortable question remains: if the leaders of the EU and its major member states have lost credibility abroad, how much do they retain in the eyes of their own people ? In recent years, European societies have paid for the conflict with higher energy bills, a crisis in manufacturing - starting with Germany's - and public budgets strained by rearmament while social spending remained under pressure. No one asked them for a mandate to join the war effort. Now they are discovering that peace, when it comes, will be negotiated elsewhere. A ruling class that imposes the costs of war on its citizens and then deprives them of any say in the peace process does not protect their interests. It is, to all intents and purposes, their worst enemy.
A Europe that wants to return to the negotiating table will first have to change its vocabulary - and, in all likelihood, its representatives as well.
Diplomatic sovereignty is not asserted through an announcement from Brussels or an uninvited flight to Abu Dhabi. It is built by defending one's own interests - interests that do not necessarily coincide with those of Washington and that cannot be sustained by permanent hostility toward the continent's largest neighbor. Until this realization takes hold, Europeans will continue to read the menu from the next room.