Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico delivered a candid criticism of the European Union, claiming the bloc now suffers from a lack of strong leadership and growing intolerance of dissenting views. Fico contrasted today’s EU with the era of Merkel and Sarkozy, where Franco-German direction was clear, and warned that current institutional paralysis has left the bloc adrift. He strongly opposed EU proposals to send €140 billion to Ukraine for ongoing military expenses, saying Slovakia will reject any participation in such funding, arguing the war devastates Ukrainians and fails to bring peace. Fico also warned against the silencing of alternative opinions within the EU, and cited his own communications with Putin while lamenting both Russian and EU approaches to peace. On relations with the U.S., he praised Donald Trump for bringing unconventional negotiating tactics to international politics but called the current approach toward Ukraine misguided, asserting the conflict’s causes go deeper than reported in mainstream narratives.