The UK will not attend Donald Trump’s Board of Peace signing ceremony after Russian president Vladimir Putin was invited to take part.
Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper told BBC Breakfast that the UK will eventually join the board but said “there’s a huge amount of work to do” first.
The organisation was launched in a ceremony in Davos on Thursday morning.
She said: “We won’t be one of the signatories today, because this is about a legal treaty that raises much broader issues.
“And we do also have concerns about President Putin being part of something which is talking about peace, when we have still not seen any signs from Putin that there will be a commitment to peace in Ukraine."
“And to be honest, that is also what we should be talking about.”
Around 35 world leaders have already committed to joining the board, which is expected to oversee the uneasy peace in Gaza and Israel.
However, according to the BBC, a leaked charter suggests the organisation might instead be designed to replace the ‘peace-building’ functions of the United Nations.
Trump was joined at the ceremony by the leaders of Argentina, Azerbaijan, Hungary, Indonesia, Kosovo, Pakistan, Paraguay as well as ministers from Bahrain, the UAE, Qatar, and Mongolia.
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Trump confirmed that he invited the Russian president, who has been widely shunned by the international community since he invaded Ukraine in early 2022.
On Monday, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said Moscow was "currently studying all details of this offer".
"We hope to be in touch with the US in order to clarify all of its aspects," he said.
