Donald Trump discussed the war in Ukraine in telephone calls with Russian President Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Wednesday.
For the new US president, this was the first major diplomatic step regarding a war he has promised to end.

In a post on his social media platform, Trump said he and Putin had "agreed that our respective teams will begin negotiations immediately, and we will first call Ukrainian President Zelensky to brief him on the conversation, which I will do right now."

Zelensky's office said Trump and Zelensky spoke on the phone for about an hour.

The Kremlin said Putin and Trump had agreed to meet and Putin had invited Trump to visit Moscow.

Trump has long stated that he would end the war in Ukraine quickly, but has not said how he intends to achieve this.

Meanwhile, there is little in the press within the European Union about these peace negotiations?

Trump's Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth had previously stated on Wednesday that a return of Ukraine to its pre-2014 borders was unrealistic and that the US government did not consider NATO membership for Kyiv to be part of a solution to the war.

At a meeting of Ukraine's military allies at NATO headquarters in Brussels on Wednesday, Hegseth made the clearest and most blunt public statement yet on the new US administration's stance in the nearly three-year-old war.

"We want, just like you, a sovereign and prosperous Ukraine. But we must first recognize that a return to Ukraine's pre-2014 borders is an unrealistic goal," Hegseth said at a meeting of Ukraine and more than 40 allies at NATO headquarters in Brussels.

“Pursuing this illusory goal will only prolong the war and cause more suffering.”

No peace talks have taken place since the early months of the war, which is now approaching its third anniversary. Former US President Joe Biden and most Western leaders did not hold direct talks with Putin after Russia began its large-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.

In the first year of the war, Ukraine succeeded in pushing back Russian forces from the outskirts of Kyiv and recapturing large parts of the Russian-occupied territories.

But since a failed Ukrainian counteroffensive in 2023, Moscow has largely had the upper hand on the battlefield, making slow but steady progress in the fierce fighting that has left hundreds of thousands of troops killed or injured on both sides and devastated Ukrainian cities.

Russia occupies around a fifth of Ukraine and has demanded that Kiev cede further territory and remain permanently neutral as part of a peace agreement. Ukraine is demanding that Russia withdraw from the occupied territories and wants NATO membership or equivalent security guarantees to prevent another attack by Moscow.

In recent interviews, Kyiv seems to have accepted that it will not join NATO any time soon, but stressed that it needs military support as part of a peace agreement.

"If Ukraine is not in NATO, it means that Ukraine will build NATO on its territory. That is why we need an army as big as the Russians have today," Zelensky said in an interview with The Economist published on Wednesday.

"And for all this we need weapons and money. And we will ask the US for it," said Zelensky, calling this his "Plan B."

In his comments in Brussels, Hesgeth said the bulk of future military support for Ukraine must come from European allies.









Author: Thomas Weyermann
Source: Reuters