Taras Kryvyy, a 29-yr-old financial analyst from Ukraine, has doubts about the possibility of a peace agreement between his country and Russia, reports RTE.
“Either Ukraine decides to accept a bad peace now, and we have a 10% chance of surviving as a sovereign state. Or, we continue fighting, and it’s like flipping a coin,” he explained to RTÉ News at a Starbucks in central Warsaw, reports RTE.
Mr. Kryvyy’s last name closely resembles the name of his hometown, Kryvyi Rih, in central Ukraine, a city predominantly Russian-speaking, where President Volodymyr Zelensky also grew up.
Ten years ago, Mr. Kryvyy relocated to Poland right after finishing secondary school to pursue a business degree.
Now, in addition to working as a financial analyst, he is also completing a PhD on energy transition, reports RTE.
“A lot of people think there is a lot happening,” he said, referring to the US-led efforts to negotiate a peace deal, reports RTE.
However, he believes that Russia’s claim over occupied Ukrainian territories is “like a bomb that cannot be defused,” as Russia is unlikely to reverse its annexation of the four Ukrainian regions: Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia, and Kherson.
For Mr. Kryvyy, surrendering Ukraine’s most fortified regions, like Donetsk, as demanded by Russian President Vladimir Putin, is “unacceptable,” reports RTE.
“The Ukrainians living in the occupied regions would become second-class citizens,” reports RTE.
During the course of the day, I spoke with other young Ukrainians living and working in Warsaw to get their views on the current US-led peace initiatives.
According to Warsaw City Council statistics from December 2024 and January 2025, up to 170,000 Ukrainian citizens may be residing in the Polish capital, which has a population of two million, reports RTE.
Many Ukrainians living and working in Warsaw are in their 20s and 30s and quickly adapt to the Polish language, which shares similarities with Ukrainian.
“We cannot sign any agreements with Russia because Russia does not honor any papers,” said Iryna Antoniuk, whom I met in the lobby of an upscale office building housing co-working spaces, reports RTE.
The 30-year-old marketing specialist arrived in Poland in March 2022, just one week after Russia’s full-scale invasion began.
She spent the first week of the war in Kyiv, sheltering in the basement of her apartment building with other residents as Russian forces attempted to encircle the city, reports RTE.
“At that moment, I just saw a black wall, no colours. It was the first time in my life that I could not plan something,” reports RTE.
A week later, she was among the many Ukrainian women and children who traveled by train from Kyiv to western Ukraine before continuing on to Poland.
In Warsaw, she secured a job with the Polish branch of the multinational company where she had worked in Kyiv, reports RTE.
An international relations graduate, she recounted the details of a 1997 security guarantee signed by Russia, which pledged to respect Ukraine’s territorial integrity, as well as the failed Minsk Agreement of 2015.
“I remember that Ukraine was essentially forced to sign this agreement. On paper, it looked like a peace deal, but in reality, it was just a continuation of the war in eastern Ukraine,” reports RTE.
Ukraine and Russia signed the Minsk Agreement, brokered by France and Germany in February 2015, to settle the conflict in Donetsk and Luhansk, where Russia was backing separatist forces, reports RTE.
However, pro-Russian separatists, with Moscow’s support, violated the Minsk-II ceasefire just hours after it was signed.
For Ms. Antoniuk, giving up any Ukrainian land in a peace deal is not an option.
“Every centimetre of our land is stained with the blood of Ukrainians who are fighting for our independence, sovereignty, and peace,” reports RTE.
“Only by supplying military systems to Ukraine can we help because Russia understands only force,” reports RTE.
When I asked her opinion about US President Donald Trump’s recent meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Alaska, her response was quick:
“Vladimir Putin is a war criminal, and the only place for him is The Hague,” reports RTE.
Viktoria Pogrebniak, a 30-year-old marketing professional from western Ukraine who has lived in Warsaw for the past 11 years, believes Ukraine should brace for the worst-case scenario.
She defines the “worst-case scenario” as the United States stepping back from the negotiations, leaving Ukraine and Europe to handle Russia alone, reports RTE.
Overall, Ms. Pogrebniak was pessimistic about the direction of the current US-led peace process, stating that only those who “do not know history” would consider ceding land to Russia.
“There’s a long history of territories Russia has occupied or sought to occupy, starting with Georgia, Abkhazia, South Ossetia, and extending to Crimea, and of course, Donbas,” reports RTE.
“Every territory they take is not the last one, until someone really stops them from taking more,” reports RTE.
In a quiet part of the Polish capital, not far from the center, I met Valeriia Shakhunova, a 25-year-old from Kherson who now works for a Ukrainian foundation in Warsaw.
We met a few hours after reports came in of Thursday’s massive Russian drone and missile attack on Kyiv, which killed 23 people, including four children.
“I am angry, but also tired. I see this happening over and over again,” she said, referring to the morning attack, reports RTE.
“Ukraine is ready to act, but from the Russian side, I don’t think they are.”
Ms. Shakhunova’s parents and two younger brothers live in the Kyiv region, having left Kherson in August 2022 when it was still under Russian control, reports RTE.
The family had to drive through fields for seven days, avoiding roads and Russian checkpoints, to reach Ukrainian-held territory.
Ukrainian forces liberated Kherson in November 2022, during the final stages of Ukraine’s counteroffensive that year.
In June, while visiting Kyiv to see her family, Ms. Shakhunova, her father, and one of her brothers traveled south to Kherson to visit their family home, which is now in an area controlled by Ukrainian forces, reports RTE.
Russian forces control 74% of the Kherson region, and the city of Kherson remains a frequent target for Russian drone attacks.
“I wanted to take some pictures from my childhood because now I understood that Kherson will not be in peace anymore for now. So for the first time, I decided I needed to collect my pictures and bring them to Warsaw,” said Ms Shakhunova, reports RTE.
“They need to sleep and live mainly in the basement, but for some reason they are not able to leave. I don’t believe Russia will stop. I believe that even if, for now, they take these territories, and we will have peace, I don’t know, for 10 years, they will use it, they will accumulate their power and they will go again,” Ms Shakhunova added, reports RTE.
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