Starmer said he wants Trump to agree that, in the event of a peace settlement in Ukraine, US will offer security guarantees that make it durable

Good morning. Keir Starmer is in Washington where later today he will have his first meeting with President Trump since the inauguration. With Trump aligning with Moscow even more explicitly than he did during his first administration, and threatening to wind down the Nato guarantees that have underpinned the security of western Europe since the second world war, the stakes could not be higher. Starmer, despite leading a party whose activists mostly loathe Trump and everything he represents, has managed to establish a warm relationship with the president and today will give some clues as to what extent he can sustain that, and protect the UK from the tariff warfare that Trump is threatening to unleash on the EU. But Starmer is one of three European leaders in Washington this week (Emmanuel Macron was there on Monday, Volodymyr Zelenskyy is there tomorrow) and today’s meeting is also part of a wider story about the fracturing of the US/Europe alliance. It is definitely in trouble; but what is not yet clear is whether after four years of Trump it will still be functioning effectively.

Starmer spoke to reporters on his flight to the US yesterday. Pippa Crerar, the Guardian’s political editor, was on the plane and, as she reports, Starmer said he wants Trump to agree that, in the event of a peace settlement in Ukraine, the US will offer security guarantees that will make it durable. He has already said that Britain would contribute troops to a European so-called “tripwire” peace-keeping force, there to defend Ukraine and deter Russia. But European soldiers would need US air and logistical support to be effective, and Starmer is looking for assurances on this topic.

I’m not going to make security guarantees beyond very much. We’re going to have Europe do that.