Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, in Berlin for “essential” talks with EU leaders and US envoys, supplied to relinquish hopes of becoming a member of NATO in alternate for alternate Western safety ensures.
“From the very starting, Ukraine’s want was to hitch NATO — these are actual safety ensures,” Zelenskyy stated on December 14 in response to a reporter’s query in a WhatsApp chat.
“Some companions from the US and Europe didn’t assist this route.”
“Thus, immediately, bilateral safety ensures between Ukraine and the US, Article 5-like ensures for us from the US, and safety ensures from European colleagues, in addition to different nations — Canada, Japan — are a chance to forestall one other Russian invasion.”
“And it’s already a compromise from our half,” he stated, including that any such assure needs to be legally binding.
Among Moscow’s different hard-line calls for, Russian President Vladimir Putin has stated Kyiv have to be barred from any transfer to hitch the Western army alliance. Many NATO members, together with the United States, have dominated out NATO entry for Ukraine, at the very least underneath present circumstances.
Zelenskyy’s December 14-15 negotiations with US envoys and European leaders are aimed toward ending the practically four-year battle in Ukraine, which has change into the deadliest battle in Europe since World War II.
Ahead of the talks, Russia intensified its assaults on Ukrainian infrastructure as disagreements over territorial management and safety ensures persist. Moscow has downplayed the importance of the Berlin talks.
“The plan isn’t going to be one thing everybody likes,” Zelenskyy instructed journalists forward of the talks. “There are, in fact, many compromises in a single type of the plan or one other.”
Zelenskyy stated he has not heard again from Washington about his proposed amendments to the 28-point US peace plan unveiled final month, which critics say closely favored Russia.
“Ukraine wants peace on dignified phrases, and we’re able to work as constructively as attainable,” Zelenskyy wrote on X. “The coming days will probably be full of diplomacy. It is critically essential that it delivers outcomes.”
US particular envoy Steve Witkoff is in Berlin for the talks, together with President Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner.
The presence of Witkoff — who has led negotiations with Kyiv and Moscow on a US peace proposal — on the talks is a sign that Washington expects some probability of progress towards ending the full-scale invasion launched by Russia in 2022.
Yet there may be little indication that Russia will reciprocate Ukraine’s flexibility. Speaking to Russian state TV on December 14, Yuri Ushakov, Putin’s overseas coverage aide, stated the proposed adjustments to the US peace plan “will hardly be constructive.”
Russia, Ukraine Continue Strikes
As the diplomacy to finish the battle hastened, assaults continued in Ukraine and Russia.
A Russian drone assault on a shopping mall in Zaporizhzhya wounded six individuals, together with a baby and a rescuer.
The Ukrainian General Staff stated its drone assaults hit a Russian oil depot in Uriupinsk, Volgograd area, and an oil refinery in Afipsky, Krasnodar area.
Zelenskyy stated the Russians launched greater than 1,500 assault drones, practically 900 guided aerial bombs, and 46 missiles of varied varieties in opposition to Ukraine this week.
“Russia is dragging out the battle and seeks to inflict as a lot hurt as attainable on our individuals,” he stated.
Meanwhile, on December 13, Ukraine accused Russia of hitting a Turkish ship transporting sunflower oil within the Black Sea.
Ukraine’s overseas minister, Andriy Sybiha, stated Russia’s assault was “an assault on the liberty of navigation and world meals safety.”
