President Volodymyr Zelensky has stated that he expects the US-Ukraine negotiations would be “a meaningful meeting” when they take place in Saudi Arabia next week, reports BBC.
Kyiv is striving for a “fast and lasting” peace, according to the Ukrainian leader, who will visit the Gulf country but will not participate in the negotiations.
Steve Witkoff, the special envoy of US President Donald Trump, stated that the American delegation wished to talk about a “framework” for peace in an effort to put an end to the conflict between Russia and Ukraine, reports BBC.
Trump claimed that Zelensky was not prepared to put a stop to the altercation during their public altercation at the White House last Friday. The United States then stopped exchanging intelligence and halted military assistance to Ukraine.
In an attempt to mend fences with the United States, Ukraine’s largest military supplier, the president of Ukraine has apologised for the incident, reports BBC.
Trump got a “apology” and “sense of gratitude” in a letter from Zelensky, according to Witkoff on Thursday.
“Hopefully, we get things back on track with the Ukrainians, and everything resumes,” Witkoff stated, reports BBC.
The Ukrainian president has been demanding solid security assurances for Kyiv, while Zelensky has been under intense pressure from the US to make compromises before any peace negotiations begin.
About 20% of Ukrainian land is currently under Russian control after the country’s full-scale invasion in February 2022, reports BBC.
Ukraine reported a “massive missile and drone” strike on its energy infrastructure Thursday night, indicating that the combat is still going on.
The strike endangered areas as far as western Ukraine, and the Polish military claimed it was compelled to activate ground-based air defence systems and scramble fighter fighters.
Following his attendance at Thursday’s crisis conference in Brussels, when European Union leaders approved plans for an increase in defence budget, Zelensky posted a series of social media postings announcing the US-Ukraine discussions in Saudi Arabia, reports BBC.
“Ukrainian and American teams have resumed work, and we hope that next week we will have a meaningful meeting,” he wrote on X, reports BBC.
“Ukraine has been seeking peace since the very first moment of the war, and we have always stated that the war continues solely because of Russia,” reports BBC.
As Moscow “accepts the need to end” the conflict, Zelensky called on the international community to exert additional pressure on it.
Additionally, he seemed to be referring to a truce proposal that French President Emmanuel Macron unveiled earlier this week. The plan called for a stop to assaults on civilian infrastructure, including electricity, and a ceasefire in the air and at sea.
Regarding the French plans, Russia has refrained from making any public remarks, reports BBC.
Moscow is looking for a settlement “that would ensure calmness for our country in the long-term perspective,” Putin stated on Thursday.
“We don’t need anything that belongs to others, but we won’t give up anything that belongs to us either,” the Kremlin leader added, reports BBC.
A “fair, lasting, binding peace agreement that every side can accept” is what China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi expressed hope for.
In addition to claiming four more Ukrainian areas in the southeast as its own, although Moscow does not have complete authority over them, Russia seized the southern Crimea peninsula of Ukraine in 2014, reports BBC.
Concern about what many on the continent perceive to be Donald Trump’s overtures to Russia has been voiced in recent weeks by Ukraine and its European allies.
Trump promised to end the war swiftly during the US election campaign, and last month, initial US-Russian negotiations took place in Saudi Arabia without the presence of European or Ukrainian delegates, reports BBC.
Trump administration officials have portrayed the US’s decision to stop providing military assistance to Ukraine as an attempt to persuade Kyiv to participate in the US-led peace negotiations.
The United States has not disclosed any comparable pressure on Moscow to make concessions, reports BBC.
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