US President Donald Trump’s new Board of Peace, which includes zero Western European allies, was roundly panned across the Old Continent on Thursday.
“We have serious doubts about a number of elements in the charter of the Board of Peace related to its scope, its governance and its compatibility with the UN Charter,” European Council chief Antonio Costa said after an EU leaders’ summit in Brussels.
Costa, a former prime minister of Portugal and former secretary general of that country’s Socialist Party, is not the only European leader to give a poor review to the $1 billion-per-entry club, with Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez also declining on Thursday the invitation to join the board meant to maintain peace in Gaza.
Russian strongman Vladimir Putin, who was among those invited, said that the Kremlin is studying the proposal, while Trump contended that the man responsible for an unprovoked invasion of Ukraine, coming up on its fifth year, had already accepted.
The current board, as unveiled by Trump at the World Economic Forum in Switzerland, is composed of about 20 members, including officials from Bahrain, Morocco, Argentina, Egypt, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bulgaria, Indonesia, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kosovo, Pakistan, Paraguay, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, the United Arab Emirates, Uzbekistan and Mongolia.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who faces an International Criminal Court arrest warrant over the war in Gaza, has said he will join but was not at the ceremony.
And while Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney had already offered a firm “no,” Trump went ahead and retroactively rescinded his offer to his northern neighbor on Thursday.
Conspicuously missing from the “yes” column was anyone from Western Europe – unsurprising, as Trump had simultaneously threatened NATO ally Denmark with war if it did not sell Greenland to the US. He has since backed down on military action as a possible recourse in the stand-off, but the geopolitical damage had already been done.
Earlier this week, French President Emmanuel Macron raised Trump’s ire by refusing to join the club. His office released a statement saying the whole proposal “goes beyond the framework of Gaza and raises serious questions, in particular with respect to the principles and structure of the United Nations, which cannot be called into question.”
Trump, as is his custom in diplomatic matters, threatened tariffs on France if it didn’t join, in addition to the 10 percent tariffs Paris already faces for its defense of Greenland.
“I’ll put a 200 percent tariff on his wines and Champagnes and he’ll join. But he doesn’t have to join,” Trump told reporters.
Belgium was at one point rumored to be interested in sending an affirmative RSVP to Trump.
But Belgian Foreign Minister Maxime Prévot set the record straight on Thursday, posting to social media that “Belgium has NOT signed the treaty of the Board of Peace. This announcement is incorrect. We wish for a common and coordinated European response. As many European countries, we have reservations to the proposal.”
British Prime Minister Keir Starmer made it clear earlier in the week that his country would not have any part of such a group, while the UK’s Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper on Thursday explained that its government had serious reservations about Putin “being part of something which is talking about peace.”
Even Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, often seen as the closest conservative friend that Trump has among European G7 members, did not express an interest in mingling in such company.
Costa, however, was polite as he distanced Europe from potential membership, noting: “We are ready to work together with the US on the implementation of the comprehensive Peace Plan for Gaza, with a Board of Peace carrying out its mission as a transitional administration.”