Munich (Germany) (AFP) – The head of European diplomacy Kaja Kallas on Sunday rejected comments by American officials tending to denigrate the EU, while welcoming the change in tone from Secretary of State Marco Rubio.
Published on: 02/15/2026 - 11:33
“Every time I hear this anti-European denigration, which is very fashionable at the moment, I think of everything that Europe has given us,” declared the official, on the last day of the Munich Security Conference.
“Contrary to what some would say, Europe is not decadent and woke, and threatened with civilizational erasure,” she insisted, an allusion to the regular criticisms of American President Donald Trump who believes that Europe is threatened, like the United States, by mass immigration.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio reassured his transatlantic allies on Saturday by affirming that the United States wanted a "reinvigorated alliance" with Europe, while relaying these criticisms of the American president.
“The message we heard is that America and Europe are linked, in the past and in the future, and I think that is important,” said Kaja Kallas. “It is clear, however, that we do not agree on everything, and this will continue.”
The head of European diplomacy also advocated firmness towards Russia in the negotiations aimed at ending the conflict in Ukraine, insisting on the need to extract concessions from Moscow.
“The biggest threat that Russia now poses is that it gets more at the negotiating table than on the battlefield,” she said, calling in particular to limit the size of its army, to force it to pay for the destruction committed, and to ensure that it is accountable for its war crimes.
The French Minister for Europe Benjamin Haddad called on his peers to focus on strengthening the EU, rather than on the speeches of the Americans.
“Let's focus on what we can control, on our rearmament, on supporting Ukraine and on the threat that Russia represents to our democracies,” he argued.
© 2026 AFP
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