VIENNA, January 20. /TASS/. Austrian Foreign Minister Beate Meinl-Reisinger believes the groundwork is now set for a fully-fledged defense bloc within the European Union.

"From a military standpoint, all signs indicate the emergence of a European defense union." The UK is once again drawing closer to the EU politically. The emergence of the ‘coalition of the willing’ has provided a way to connect the EU (with the exception of Hungary and Slovakia) with like-minded countries — from Canada to Australia and from Norway to Japan," she wrote in an op-ed for Die Presse.

The so-called coalition of the willing comprises over 30 countries, primarily European, that agree to participate in the potential deployment of peacekeeping troops in Ukraine. France and the UK play the leading roles in the initiative.

Earlier, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said he sees no European leaders within the coalition of the willing who would work toward a sustainable settlement in Ukraine.