US President Donald Trump said he would soon meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Budapest to discuss a way to end the war in Ukraine, Reuters reported, BTA writes.
What a peace agreement could look like:
Who would get what?
According to the Russian military, Russia controls more than 116,000 square kilometers, or more than 19% of Ukraine, an area about half the size of the United Kingdom.
Russia claims that Crimea, which Moscow annexed in 2014, the Donetsk and Luhansk regions, together known as Donbass, as well as Zaporizhia and Kherson, are now legally part of Russia.
Three sources familiar with Kremlin thinking said after Putin's summit with Trump in August that Putin had demanded that Ukraine withdraw from the parts of Donetsk region controlled by Ukrainian forces – about 5,300 sq km, or about 20% of the entire area.
This is less than its initial demand from 2024 that Kiev cede all of Donbas plus Kherson and Zaporizhia to the south, an area of nearly 20,000 sq km.
Russia wants Western leaders to recognize Crimea, which was handed over to Ukraine in 1954 by Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev, as part of Russia, citing the recognition of Kosovo as independent in 2008 against the will of Russia and Serbia.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky acknowledged that some territories occupied by Russia could be recognized as temporarily de facto occupied, but ruled out any legal recognition. He pointed out that he had no mandate to cede territory and that any withdrawal would expose both Ukraine and its European allies to new Russian attacks.
What about NATO?
One of Putin’s most important conditions for ending the war is that Western leaders commit in writing to halt the eastward expansion of the U.S.-led North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Russian officials cite a 1990 assurance from U.S. Secretary of State James Baker to Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev.
NATO leaders agreed in 2008 that Ukraine and Georgia would one day become members, and Ukraine has laid out the path to the alliance and the EU in its constitution. It says any change would have to be approved by referendum, an unlikely prospect.
Trump has said that previous US support for Ukraine’s NATO bid was one of the reasons for the war, and has indicated that Ukraine will not be granted membership.
The alliance says it is up to individual countries whether they want to join, but that it is not discussing NATO membership for Kiev, but rather security guarantees.
What would security guarantees be?
Ukraine wants assurances that it will not be attacked again, but the West is not eager to sign up to anything that could tie it to a future war with Russia, the world’s largest nuclear power. The EU and NATO have so far focused on practical support, infrastructure readiness and strategic deterrence.
Russia is eager to revive a draft agreement from April 2022 that would have provided for permanent neutrality for Ukraine in exchange for security guarantees from the five permanent members of the UN Security Council – Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States.
Ukraine and its European allies have said that Moscow is not a reliable guarantor and that neutrality for Ukraine would leave Europe vulnerable.
Moscow has also demanded restrictions on Ukraine’s armed forces and protection for Russian-speaking and Orthodox believers. Kiev rules out any restrictions on its armed forces and says Russian-speakers already have all the necessary protection, citing the fact that Zelensky himself is a native speaker of Russian.
Trade prospects and frozen assets
After speaking with Putin on Thursday, Trump raised the prospect of resuming trade between the United States and Russia if peace is achieved. Many in Washington are concerned about the unfettered partnership between Putin and Chinese leader Xi Jinping and suggest an attempt to bring Russia closer to the United States. Of particular importance to Russia would be the ability to use the U.S. dollar in global transactions and the reopening of Western financial institutions to Russian money. European powers are seeking a way to finance Ukraine’s defense and reconstruction with some of the 210 billion euros worth of Russian assets frozen in the West. Russia argues that taking the money would be theft, undermine confidence in the euro as a reserve currency, and trigger years of legal reprisals. Moscow has suggested that some of the money be spent on rebuilding the areas of Ukraine it controls.
Ukrainian children kidnapped by Russia
US First Lady Melania Trump said she had maintained an open line of communication with Putin on the repatriation of Ukrainian children affected by Russia's war against Ukraine. Kiev is already working with Qatar to free some children and has expressed hope that more may be released.