Britain to snub Trump’s signing ceremony for Gaza Board of Peace over Putin involvement
Yvette Cooper has confirmed that Britain will not attend Donald Trump’s Gaza Peace Board signing ceremony due to concerns about Vladimir Putin’s involvement.
The foreign secretary said Britain would not attend today’s ceremony, expressing his discomfort with the Russian President “being part of something that talks about peace”.
Sir Keir Starmer has expressed concerns about the panel in recent days, with his spokesman telling reporters the UK was “still reviewing the terms”.
The Kremlin has accepted the board’s invitation and is “studying the details” to clarify “all the nuances,” according to spokesman Dmitry Peskov.
Ms Cooper told BBC Breakfast: “We won’t be one of the signatories today because this is about a legal agreement that raises much wider issues.”
“We also have concerns about President Putin being part of something that talks about peace when we have yet to see any sign that Putin will commit to peace in Ukraine.”
He added: “We are not one of the signatories today, but we will continue to have international discussions, including with our allies, about how we will work with this and how we will work going forward on the peace process for Gaza.”
The “Peace Board” was first created by Mr. Trump as a small group of world leaders to oversee the reconstruction of Gaza but has since begun to play a broader role.
Mr. Trump is sending invitations to dozens of countries and suggesting that the body could soon mediate various international conflicts, similar to the faux UN Security Council.
About 35 countries have agreed to sign on to the project and another 60 have been invited to participate, a senior U.S. administration official told reporters on Wednesday.
The US president said on Wednesday that there were “so many wonderful people who want to join” and called it “the most prestigious board ever created.”
So far, Norway, Sweden and France have said they will not sit on the board for now due to rising tensions between the United States and NATO over Trump’s desire to own Greenland. According to the national newspaper, Italy is also preparing to reject the invitation Corriere della Sera.
While French officials supported the Gaza peace plan, they emphasized that they were concerned that the body might try to replace the UN as the main venue for conflict resolution.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who was also invited to attend, told the media on Tuesday that it was difficult for him to imagine being with Russia on one body or another.
Board members include US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Trump envoy Steve Witkoff, Trump son-in-law Jared Kushner, former British prime minister Tony Blair, Apollo Global Management CEO Marc Rowan, World Bank president Ajay Banga and Mr Trump’s deputy national security adviser Robert Gabriel.
U.N. officials have so far dismissed concerns that Trump is trying to distance himself from the organization and said on Wednesday it was unlikely to replace decades of multilateral peacebuilding involving more than 190 member nations.
“There are numerous organizations (regional organizations, defense alliances and others) that have co-existed with the UN over the 80 years that the UN has existed,” said UN deputy spokesman Farhan Haq.
