Starmer to deploy UK warships to Arctic following Trump’s Greenland threats

Sir Keir Starmer told Europe it has to be ready to “fight” Russian aggression as he announced the UK would deploy warships and fighter jets to the Arctic later this year.

The move, announced at the Munich Security Conference, will be seen as a bid to appease Donald Trump, after he threatened to annex Greenland, citing security concerns in the region.

But even as the PM hailed what he said would be a demonstration of the trans-Atlantic relationship, US secretary of state Marco Rubio warned the continent’s leaders over their mistakes and said America needed a partner with the “will to survive”.

It came as Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky hit out at the US, saying his country was being asked to make concessions to Russia “too often” in America-brokered peace talks and that Europe was being sidelined.

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During an eventful day at the summit:

Addressing the event on Saturday morning, Sir Keir said leaders must not dither because “Russia has proved its appetite for aggression”.

He warned that, even if there were a peace deal for Ukraine, Russia’s rearmament “would only accelerate”.

“We must answer this threat in full,” he said. “The road ahead is straight and it is clear. We must build our hard power, because that is the currency of the age.

“We must be able to deter aggression, and, yes, if necessary, we must be ready to fight.”

Announcing the warships, the prime minister said that the US, Canada and other Britain in bolstering security across what is known as the High North.

Mr Trump has claimed that Europe does not do enough to defend Greenland, which is strategically important to the US, from threats by Russia and China.

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During his address, Sir Keir also hit out at Mr Trump’s claims that he is unsure if other Nato allies would come to the US’s defence.

One of the alliance’s founding principles, Article 5, is that an attack on one Nato member is an attack on all. It has only been invoked once, after the 9/11 terror attacks in New York.

“Be in no doubt, if called on, the UK would come to your aid today,” he told the president.

As the world approaches the fourth anniversary of the Russian invasion of Ukraine later this month, he said the UK recognised the “urgency” of the need for closer defence ties with the EU.

In a move that will infuriate Brexiteers at home, he also said that Britain should move towards “deeper economic integration” with the EU, aiming to “move closer to the single market” in various sectors. He insisted his cabinet was in full agreement as he attempted to brush off the Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar’s bid to oust him from office, saying he “ended the week much stronger than I started it”. His speech came less than an hour after an address by Mr Rubio, who warned Europe that the US did not want to be caretakers of Western “decline”.

He criticised countries he said had not spent enough on defence and too much on welfare, had appeased a climate “cult” to their own economic detriment, had allowed too much immigration, and had not defended their history as he hit out at what he said was a “malaise of hopelessness and complacency”.

But Mr Zelensky in turn attacked the US, saying: “The Americans often return to the topic of concessions and too often those concessions are discussed only in the context of Ukraine, not Russia.”

He said he hoped the US would stay involved in the negotiations and that there would be an opportunity for Europe to play a larger role.

“Europe is practically not present at the table. It’s a big mistake, to my mind,” he said.