Ukraine should do all it can to ensure that the war with Russia ends next year through diplomacy, President Volodymyr Zelensky said at a crucial moment after Donald Trump’s victory in the U.S. presidential election and as Russia makes gains on the battlefield. But the Ukrainian president said Russian President Vladimir Putin was not interested in reaching a peace deal, and argued that it would suit Moscow to sit in on talks while it continues the war.
“From our side, we must do everything possible to end this war next year, to end it through diplomatic channels,” Zelensky explained in a radio interview broadcast today. Moscow’s ambassador to the UN headquarters in Geneva said the day before yesterday, Thursday, that Russia would be open to negotiations to end the war if they were initiated by Trump, though he added that they would have to recognize the “realities on the ground.”
Moscow is using the phrase to say that Ukraine should give up four regions partly occupied by Russian forces and claimed by Russia in their entirety.
Zelensky has said repeatedly since Russia’s invasion in February 2022 that peace cannot be established until all Russian forces are driven out and all territories occupied by Moscow, including Crimea, are returned.
Yet a return to Ukraine’s internationally recognized 1991 borders is not noted in the president’s “victory plan” that he publicly unveiled last month.
Zelensky said the war is likely to end sooner under Trump, who often said during his campaign that he would end the war quickly, without explaining how.
Meanwhile, the Ukrainian president explained that US law prevents him from meeting with Trump before he is sworn in on January 20.
“We will do everything in our power (to secure a meeting). We had a really good meeting in September,” Zelenski said, adding that he would only speak directly with the Republican himself and not through an envoy or adviser.
The situation in eastern Ukraine
Zelensky acknowledged that the situation on the front in eastern Ukraine is difficult and that Russian forces are making progress.
Moscow’s forces are now closing in on Kurakovo, which has a thermal power station and is just 7 kilometers from Pokrovsk, a large city which for much of the war has been a logistics hub for Ukraine.
On the battlefields of eastern Ukraine, Russia is now advancing at the fastest pace since the early days of the war in 2022. Zelensky said the situation is difficult for several reasons, one of which is delays of up to a year in equipping units, in part because the U.S. Congress delayed for months last winter in approving aid to Ukraine.
However, he said some of those units will now enter combat.
“To stop the Russian army, new reserves with the equipment we have waited so long for will now arrive,” he said.
Ukraine is seeking to boost its own weapons production to reduce dependence on allies. Zelensky said Ukraine is now building four different missiles, which he said are currently in the testing stage.
