Europe holds the line as US steps back from Ukraine ultimatum

Good morning. News to start: The EU is planning to tighten its foreign investment rules to ensure that Chinese companies do not gain advantages from the bloc’s open market without generating benefits for local workers and sharing technology.

Today, I report on how Europe’s diplomatic rearguard effort to stymie US President Donald Trump’s ultimatum to Ukraine bore fruit in Geneva yesterday. And my Brussels colleague reports on a rearguard effort by glassmakers to save fancy alcohol and perfume bottles from EU regulations.

Whiplash

For the European national security advisers who scrambled to Geneva yesterday to negotiate Ukraine’s future, there was a satisfying outcome: a US-Russian peace proposal that days earlier had been forced down Ukraine’s throat was all of a sudden open to rewrites.

Context: The Trump administration had proposed a 28-point peace plan to end the war in Ukraine. Drawn up with Russia, the document contained multiple demands that Kyiv and its European allies have already rejected.

Yesterday’s talks got off to an inauspicious start. Trump bellowed at Ukrainian and European leaders for failing to agree with his ceasefire plan, and accused them of taking US support for granted. That followed a statement from a dozen of Kyiv’s allies pushing back against the plan as a “draft . . . which will require additional work”.

But in Geneva, that was ultimately proved correct.

US secretary of state Marco Rubio said after the day-long meetings that a “tremendous” amount of progress had been made. “I feel very optimistic that we’re going to get there in a very reasonable period of time,”

The Europeans came to Geneva with three major red lines: no forcing of Ukraine to give up territory not under Russian occupation; no limits on Ukraine’s post-war armed forces that would leave it unable to defend itself; and a veto for the EU over issues that directly affect it, such as sanctions against Moscow and frozen Russian assets in EU member states.

There was — for the first time in the almost four-year-long war — US acknowledgment on the third point.

Speaking last night, Rubio said he had assured European officials that any elements of the plan that directly concerned Europe or Nato would be put into a “separate track” in the talks, as their input was required.

There is still much to be negotiated. Ukraine is set to have to make some very difficult choices on the most sensitive parts of the plan.

European diplomats, struggling to keep track of the geopolitical cross-continental snakes and ladders and diplomatic whiplash in Washington, said that the most important issue for the ongoing talks was that EU states were aligned on their demands and principles towards Ukraine.

“I don’t want to declare victory or finality here,” added Rubio. “There’s still some work to be done.”

Chart du jour: Sweeteners

European banks are dangling incentives for investors, helping boost their share prices even as a lengthy sector-wide rally loses steam.

Hitting the bottle

Europe’s glass manufacturers are up in arms over Brussels’ efforts to cut down on packaging, arguing that it will move jobs outside the EU and make life very boring for booze, perfume and make-up consumers, writes Alice Hancock.

Context: New rules on packaging and packaging waste in the EU came into force this year. One of the provisions is for packaging manufacturers to cut down to a minimum the amount of packing surrounding a product — a clause which applies as much to Amazon boxes as to luxury goods such as spirits and perfume bottles.

In a letter to the European Commission seen by the Financial Times, 23 chief executives of glass packaging companies said that the criteria for cutting packaging do not take account of product presentation or brand identity, arguing that “for sectors such as wine, spirits, cosmetics, perfumery, beverages and gourmet foods design freedom is essential”.

Not allowing manufacturers to present their products in uniquely shaped bottles undermines “the important role” that “marketing, brand differentiation, product presentation and consumer acceptance play in ensuring the leadership of European brands and high-quality productions in today’s globalized world”, the chief executives wrote.

They have asked that the commission review that part of the law during a simplification of its environmental rule book due to be proposed on December 3 in order “to avoid drab uniformity on shop shelves”.

The commission confirmed it had received the letter and said that work on the simplification process was ongoing.

The forthcoming simplification proposal is already prompting backlash from environmental campaigners, however. Almost 200,000 responses were submitted to an open consultation — some from industry but many from campaigners and citizens.

What to watch today

1. EU and African Union leaders meet for summit in Luanda, Angola.

2. European parliament plenary session begins in Strasbourg.

3. EU trade ministers meet in Brussels.

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