Russia has said it would accept proposals for Ukraine’s postwar security guarantees, according to President Zelensky’s chief of staff.
Kyrylo Budanov said in an interview aired on Ukrainian television: “At the last talks, the Russian side said, for example, that they would accept the security guarantees offered to Ukraine by the United States.”
The agreement has not yet been confirmed by the Kremlin, but it could signal the biggest breakthrough in ceasefire negotiations since the start of the full-scale invasion four years ago.
It is unclear what those security guarantees would look like exactly, but last month Zelensky said it could include a standing army of 800,000 Ukrainian soldiers, backed by weapons and training from western allies.
The UK-led “coalition of the willing” has also pledged a peacekeeping force, including at least 5,000 soldiers each from the UK and France.
Several rounds of talks have taken place in Abu Dhabi and Geneva over the past months, with seemingly little substantive progress. Earlier in February, negotiations in Switzerland were reportedly “very tense” and lasted more than six hours in different bilateral and trilateral formats.
Budanov added that, at present, Russia had not agreed to a summit between Zelensky and President Putin. The proposed meeting had been suggested as a possibility by the US special envoy, Steve Witkoff.
In previous talks, Russia continued its demands that Ukraine give up the remaining 20 per cent of the eastern region of Donetsk that Moscow has failed to capture. Kyiv has repeatedly refused to do so, instead offering to enact a demilitarised zone, where both sides retreat from the front line, in exchange for security guarantees.
Despite negotiations, both sides have continued their almost nightly exchange of drones and missiles. Hours before talks resumed on Thursday, Russia launched around 420 drones and almost 40 missiles in six different regions of Ukraine, injuring dozens of people.
Western military officials believe that at least two-thirds of Ukraine’s energy production capacity has been destroyed, damaged or occupied by Russia since the Autumn.
But American and European sanctions have continued to hamper Russia’s ability to fund its war. Although domestic wartime industries are ramping up in Russia, particularly in the production of drones and ballistic missiles, its energy industry has been in decline. Russia’s energy revenues last year fell by about a fifth compared with 2024.
Earlier this year, Lukoil, one of the country’s two biggest energy companies, began a large overseas asset sale at a significant discount as a result of sanctions levied by the Trump administration. European Union sanctions on fuel imports and combined efforts to target Russia’s shadow fleet tankers also led to a 25 per cent drop in Russia’s oil and gas exports last year, according to Russia’s finance ministry.
This month, the European parliament approved a new €90 billion (£80 billion) loan for Ukraine, €60 billion of which is earmarked for military procurement.
https://www.thetimes.com/world/russ...cept-us-security-guarantees-ukraine-t28s0zn5w (Archive)
