Together with about 30 colleagues from Europe and countries like Canada, Australia, and Japan, the defense chiefs discussed the situation in Ukraine.
French President Emmanuel Macron was present to emphasize the seriousness and wants to see a plan for defining "credible security guarantees" for Ukraine, reports news agency AFP.
No exact details about what each country could contribute were discussed by Claesson and his colleagues.
We're not quite there yet, looking at specifics. It would also be risky to start with resource dimensions and build missions from that, says ÖB at a Swedish press conference afterwards.
We need a military mission that we can relate to when we look at what type of forces and what scope, he notes.
At a distance?
Few expect a "traditional" peacekeeping operation in the style of what the UN has done over the years.
This could very well be about entirely different capabilities, such as using technical aids to verify a ceasefire or a truce and, in different phases, taking a deeper commitment to support the implementation of an agreement, says Claesson.
The work on European security guarantees has primarily been driven by France and the UK. According to news agency AP, the plans involve, among other things, monitoring the frontline from a distance, using drones and other technology. Troop forces of up to 30,000 people are to be kept further back, for example, at nuclear power plants. The Black Sea is to be patrolled by Western vessels, and air defense is to be guaranteed from bases in neighboring countries like Poland and Romania.
"Needs to go fast"
Considering the many sudden turns of the past few weeks, the willing participants must in any case be ready for an operation to quickly become a reality.
We've gotten used to things changing hour by hour over the past few weeks. We must think that this needs to go fast, when an agreement is finally in place, says Michael Claesson in Paris.
