US allies set to plead with Trump to stand behind Ukraine - Bloomberg
Kyiv • UNN
President Zelenskyy arrived in Washington to discuss possible peace agreement terms that were discussed between Trump and Putin in Alaska. Allies are concerned about potential territorial concessions and seek clear security guarantees for Ukraine.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and his European allies arrive in Washington on Monday, eagerly awaiting to learn what commitments US President Donald Trump made at the summit with Kremlin leader Vladimir Putin, and fearing that he will force Kyiv to make unpleasant concessions, writes UNN with reference to Bloomberg.
Details
Trump will host Zelenskyy and several European leaders to outline the terms of a potential peace agreement he discussed with Putin at a meeting last Friday in Alaska.
The US is expected to focus on territorial concessions demanded by Russia, while Kyiv will seek to clearly define possible security guarantees, according to a person familiar with the matter.
Allies are anxious because they have few options to counter Trump's demands, which Ukraine may oppose, and they are skeptical that Putin truly wants peace, the publication notes. It adds: another problem is Trump himself: he wants a quick peace deal but has not clarified how to achieve it.
According to other sources familiar with the situation, "Trump told leaders during a weekend phone call that he was open to US participation in security guarantees for Ukraine."
He also told allies that he wants to reach an agreement quickly and will urge Ukraine to agree to it, intending to hold a meeting between Putin and Zelenskyy within a week. Many Europeans consider this timeline too aggressive given the number of unresolved issues.
According to sources, Trump revealed fragments of his conversations with Putin in phone calls with allied leaders, albeit without much detail. High-ranking European diplomats "privately expressed disappointment with the outcome, noting that Putin seemed to have benefited most from the summit."
Zelenskyy "can end the war with Russia almost immediately if he wants, or he can continue to fight," Trump said in a Truth Social post. He suggested that the Crimean peninsula would not be returned and stated that Ukraine would not be allowed to join NATO, without going into detail, the publication writes.
Leaders also took into account the fact that Trump's own team tried to temper expectations of a quick solution.
"We are still far from it," Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who participated in the summit, told Fox News on Sunday. "We are not on the verge of a peace agreement. We are not on the verge of concluding it. But I believe progress has been made."
Over the weekend, Trump played golf and avoided further details about his meeting with the Kremlin leader. In Truth Social posts, he stated that the media "distorts the truth when it comes to me."
"I can't say or do anything for them to write or report about me honestly," he said. "I had a great meeting in Alaska about Biden's stupid war, a war that shouldn't have happened at all!"
In a series of television interviews, Rubio stated that Monday's meeting would focus on security guarantees for Ukraine, including US contributions. He also stated that the US had little to lose if negotiations failed, and that the continuation of the war would have little impact on the daily lives of Americans, "suggesting that Trump may be ready to completely distance himself from the conflict," the publication writes.
"In his phone calls, Trump also stated that Putin wants Ukraine to cede control of its entire eastern Donbas region, Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts, reaffirming his former demands," as previously reported by Bloomberg.
"Russia will also cease its claims to parts of Ukraine's Zaporizhzhia and Kherson regions that it does not currently control, effectively freezing the front lines in their current positions. The Kremlin may also withdraw troops from areas of northeastern Ukraine adjacent to the Russian border, where its forces control only small sections of land," the publication notes.
This, as the publication writes, "creates the likelihood that the 'territorial exchange' that Trump hinted at as part of any agreement will be skewed in Putin's favor, giving him control over territories beyond those captured, which will be compensated by small concessions of lands that already belonged to Ukraine."
"If we are weak today in relations with Russia, we are preparing tomorrow's conflicts, and they will affect Ukrainians," said French President Emmanuel Macron, who will be among the leaders joining Zelenskyy in Washington. "And let's not deceive ourselves: they can also affect us, while our country continues to regularly face cyberattacks."
Trump's special envoy Steve Witkoff, who also attended Friday's summit, said on CNN on Sunday: "We reached an agreement that the US and other countries can actually offer Ukraine wording similar to Article 5."
"This is a reference to NATO's mutual defense clause, which obliges member states to respond in the event of an attack on any of them. Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni made a similar proposal in March, although Witkoff did not specify what security guarantees could be offered to Ukraine. The US has ruled out Ukraine's membership in NATO," the publication states.
Something similar to Article 5 would be important, but it would require American involvement, said John Herbst, a former US ambassador to Ukraine and now senior director of the Atlantic Council's Eurasia Center. "European troops, at a minimum, would need American intelligence and American logistics," he said in an interview.