By Christian Edwards, Joseph Ataman, Melissa Bell, CNN

(CNN) — The United Kingdom and France have agreed to deploy forces in Ukraine if it strikes a peace deal with Russia, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said, in a renewed push by Western leaders to guarantee Kyiv’s post-war security and deter Moscow from further aggression.

After officials from 35 countries gathered in Paris for a meeting of the so-called Coalition of the Willing, Starmer and French President Emmanuel Macron signed a “declaration of intent” to put British and French boots on the ground in Ukraine in the event of a peace deal – a move Russia has long staunchly opposed.

“Following a ceasefire, the UK and France will establish military hubs across Ukraine and build protected facilities for weapons and military equipment to support Ukraine’s defensive needs,” Starmer said at a joint news conference alongside European leaders, as well as US special envoy Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, President Donald Trump’s son-in-law.

Tuesday’s meeting – the largest since the coalition was founded last spring – had risked being overshadowed by the US’ toppling of Venezuela’s authoritarian leader, Nicolas Maduro, as well as by Trump’s coveting of Greenland, the vast autonomous Arctic territory ruled by Denmark. Just days after the Venezuela raid, Trump’s deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller underlined the administration’s claims on the island, telling CNN that Greenland should “obviously” be a part of the US and that “nobody is going to fight the United States” over its future.

Before the meeting, analysts had questioned whether the US could be trusted to guarantee Ukraine’s security while it is threatening to occupy the territory of Denmark, a fellow NATO member.

But, despite Washington’s sharp pivot toward the Western hemisphere, Witkoff stressed that the Trump administration remains determined “to do everything possible” to bring peace to Ukraine, and said “a lot of progress” had been made in Paris.

“We think we’re largely finished with security protocols, which are important, so that the people of Ukraine know that when this ends, it ends forever,” the envoy said, referring to Russia’s nearly four-year war.

In an interview with CNN on the sidelines of the meeting, NATO chief Mark Rutte said Tuesday’s meeting had been “very successful.”

“I’m absolutely convinced that, if this gets into place, that Putin will never, ever try again to attack Ukraine,” Rutte said.

There was no immediate reaction from Moscow, but the Kremlin has repeatedly stressed that it will not agree to foreign troops operating in Ukraine as part of a peacekeeping force. President Vladimir Putin said in September that any Western troops in Ukraine would be considered “legitimate targets.”

If a peace deal is struck, security guarantees will include a “continuous, reliable ceasefire monitoring system” led by the US and supported by other nations, the members of the Coalition of the Willing said in a joint stateme

WJLA, WUSA, CNN

By Annie Grayer, Marshall Cohen, CNN

(CNN) — Five years after the January 6, 2021, insurrection at the US Capitol, the fundamental facts of that day continue to fuel deep divisions that have created dueling political realities.

On Tuesday, members of the former January 6 select committee – whose final report concluded that President Donald Trump incited the violence at the Capitol that day – will convene a hearing to reexamine their findings.

As that hearing is underway, members of the far-right Proud Boys – including its former leader Enrique Tarrio, who was serving a 22-year prison term for seditious conspiracy before getting pardoned by Trump last year – are expected to hold a march to the Capitol that they say will be “patriotic and peaceful.”

The day’s split-screen highlights how the January 6 attack has left a political schism in its wake. Many Democrats insist the day is a painful reminder of Trump’s past and ongoing threat to democracy and fair elections, while the president and most Republicans either ignore it or recast the day’s events and diminish the level of violence.

The lawmakers who dedicated 18 months of their careers to the comprehensive House investigation are grappling with how the truth about Trump’s role in January 6 can break through in this current political moment – where Trump continues to claim that he won the 2020 election and has taken significant steps to reward rioters and deflect blame for the attack.

“He has people who support him – they have a right to vote for whoever they want,” Democratic Rep. Zoe Lofgren, who served on the committee, told CNN. “I can’t change that reality. What I can do, is release the actual reality. And this is an occasion for us to reissue some of the documentation, especially the video documentation.”

House Speaker Mike Johnson has still not hung a plaque honoring the heroism of the Capitol Police officers who defended the complex on January 6, even though federal law required it to be installed by 2023. Instead, many Democrats have poster copies hanging outside their congressional offices.

The speaker’s office told CNN that the law authorizing the January 6 commemorative plaque “is not implementable,” but did not elaborate on what they view as the shortfalls of the statute in a statement.

“If Democrats are serious about commemorating the work of USCP officers, they are free to work with the appropriate committees of jurisdiction to develop a framework for proper vetting and consideration,” a spokesperson for the speaker said.

Trump isn’t expected to hold any official commemorations for the annivers

Por Gonzalo Zegarra, CNN en Español

“No sé si van a resistir, pero Cuba ahora no tiene ingresos. Todos sus ingresos venían de Venezuela, del petróleo venezolano”, dijo el presidente de EE.UU., Donald Trump, en un oscuro panorama para la isla, que depende de la asistencia de Caracas para llegar, siquiera, a la mitad de sus necesidades energéticas.

Un cambio brusco en este sentido marcaría un golpe fatal para la economía del Gobierno castrista, aunque analistas señalan que la ayuda podría mantenerse bajo la gestión de la presidente encargada, Delcy Rodríguez, y las presiones de Washington.

En los últimos años Cuba se acostumbró a convivir con apagones prolongados, que este martes dejaron sin luz al 54 % del país, según estimaciones de la estatal Unión Eléctrica (UNE). Con infraestructura obsoleta y escaso mantenimiento, necesita desesperadamente los casi 30.000 barriles diarios de petróleo que Venezuela envió en promedio durante 2025, según datos de Reuters.

La presión sobre el castrismo siempre fue una prioridad para el secretario de Estado, Marco Rubio, un halcón de la política exterior de EE.UU., quien dijo a NBC que La Habana “está en problemas”, sin ahondar en cuáles serían los próximos pasos. El canciller de Cuba, Bruno Rodríguez, sostiene que Washington quiere un cambio de régimen en la isla, lo que no fue negado por la Casa Blanca. Rubio declaró que no es un secreto que no son sus mayores seguidores.

“Cuba está atravesando su peor momento”, dijo a CNN el economista e investigador Everleny Pérez Villanueva, exdirector del Centro de Estudios de la Economía Cubana de la Universidad de La Habana. El investigador repasa la alta inflación (14,5 % interanual en noviembre), los apagones, una fuerte caída del turismo y una deteriorada cartilla de abastecimiento de alimentos básicos. “Es un cuadro muy desolador para todo, aún sin tener en cuenta lo de Venezuela”, apuntó.

La Habana y Caracas, aliados ideológicos estrechos, mantienen desde el año 2000 un convenio de cooperación a través del cual Venezuela envía petróleo a cambio del trabajo de médicos cubanos, profesionales de la educación, el deporte y otras esferas, que permanecen en el país sudamericano. El fin de semana los dos gobiernos reconocieron por primera vez el envío también de militares que trabajan en el aparato de seguridad del chavismo, tras conocerse la muerte de 32 cubanos durante la operación militar en la que fue capturado Maduro.

“Los 32 cubanos que acaban de morir, murieron por el petróleo, es parte del intercambio”, dijo Everleny.

La asistencia de Venezuela, no obstante, está lejos de su cúspide, cuando llegó a enviar cerca de 100.000 barriles diarios hace una década. “La dependencia no es la que tenía hace 10 años, eso fue bajando y Cuba ha venido apretándose”, señaló Everleny.

Trump dejó claro que busca medidas favorables a sus intereses por parte del chavismo tras la captura del presidente Nicolás Maduro y la amenaza de nuevos ataques, pero está por verse hasta dónde llegaría ese tutelaje. “No se sabe cuál va a ser la postura del nuevo Gobie

CNN

By Issy Ronald, CNN

(CNN) — When US forces struck the Venezuelan capital and ousted the country’s president Nicolás Maduro on Saturday, it turned one of President Donald Trump’s rhetorical threats into reality.

In the days since, his frequent musings about other items on his foreign policy wishlist have rung with renewed force, especially his repeated desire for the US to take over Greenland – the vast autonomous Arctic territory ruled by Denmark.

In the wake of such a brazen display of US military power in Venezuela, this rhetoric has taken on a different character, straining Washington’s relationship with its NATO ally.

Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen reiterated Monday that she had already “made it very clear where the Kingdom of Denmark stands, and that Greenland has repeatedly said that it does not want to be part of the United States.”

She even warned that it could lead to the demise of the NATO alliance.

So why might Trump keep turning his attention to this remote, sparsely populated island – and why is it causing tensions with Europe?

Here’s what you need to know.

What is Greenland like?

Greenland, a resource-rich island of 836,000 square miles (2.16 million square kilometers) is a former Danish colony and now an autonomous territory of Denmark, situated in the Arctic.

It’s the world’s least densely populated country and is so remote that its 56,000 residents travel by boat, helicopter and plane between its towns, which are predominantly scattered along the island’s western coast. Nuuk, the territory’s capital city, is emblematic of those towns, featuring brightly colored houses crowed together between a jagged coastline and inland mountains.

Outside the towns, Greenland is mostly wilderness with 81% of its land under ice. Nearly 90% of its population is of Inuit origin and the territory’s economy has long revolved around fishing.

Why is it so important strategically?

Greenland occupies a strategic geopolitical position, sitting between the US and Europe and astride the so-called GIUK gap – a maritime passage between Greenland, Iceland, and the UK that links the Arctic to the Atlantic Ocean.

Its rich deposits of natural resources, including oil, gas and rare earth minerals, make it even more strategically important, especially as China has leveraged its domination of the rare earth industry to exert pressure on the US. These rare earth minerals are increasingly crucial to the global economy since they are required to manufacture everything from electric cars and wind turbines to military equipment.

Greenland’s trove of minerals may become more accessible as the climate crisis melts Arctic ice, a phenomenon which also makes northern shipping routes navigable for more time throughout the year, pot

By Kit Maher, CNN

(CNN) — The White House said Tuesday that it is “discussing a range of options” to acquire Greenland, noting that using the US military is not off the table.

“President Trump has made it well known that acquiring Greenland is a national security priority of the United States, and it’s vital to deter our adversaries in the Arctic region. The President and his team are discussing a range of options to pursue this important foreign policy goal, and of course, utilizing the U.S. Military is always an option at the Commander in Chief’s disposal,” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said in a statement to CNN.

President Donald Trump has shown renewed interest in recent days in acquiring the Danish territory, spurring a statement of support for Denmark from European leaders earlier Tuesday.

Senior White House aide Stephen Miller told CNN’s Jake Tapper on Monday that nobody would fight the US militarily “over the future of Greenland.”

This story is developing and will be updated.

The-CNN-Wire
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