Berlin (AFP) – Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky flew to Berlin on Sunday for two days of talks with European leaders and US President Donald Trump’s envoys on ending the almost four-year war with Russia. While fighting raged on in Ukraine, Zelensky was greeted by German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, who on Monday is also due to host other European leaders, among them Britain’s Keir Starmer, and the heads of NATO and the EU. Merz greeted Zelensky at the chancellery, with a large number of police guarding the site, an AFP photographer saw.
Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff and the US president’s son-in-law Jared Kushner were earlier seen at a Berlin hotel, as were top Ukrainian negotiator Rustem Umerov and a German senior official, Bild daily reported. According to a Ukrainian source interviewed by AFP, Zelensky, Umerov, and Deputy Foreign Minister Sergiy Kyslytsya were later Sunday due to meet Witkoff and Kushner at the chancellery.
As he headed to Germany, Zelensky said he was ready for “dialogue” on ending the grinding war that started with Russia launching a full-scale invasion in February 2022. “The summit in Berlin is important,” he added. “We are meeting with both the Americans and the Europeans.”
Zelensky said he hoped the United States would back the idea of freezing the front line where it is, rather than Ukraine ceding the entire Donbas region as Moscow demands. “The fairest possible option is to ‘stay where we are’,” Zelensky told reporters in an online briefing. “This is true because it is a ceasefire… I know that Russia does not view this positively, and I would like the Americans to support us on this issue.”
Trump has been stepping up pressure on Kyiv to reach an agreement since revealing a plan last month to end the war that was criticized as echoing Moscow’s demands. The proposal has triggered a flurry of diplomacy between the United States and Ukraine’s European allies, with Kyiv officials recently saying they had sent Washington a revised version.
Zelensky told reporters he had not received a response from Washington on Ukraine’s amendments, but added, “I am receiving all the signals and will be ready for the dialogue that will begin today.” In Russia, Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov cast doubt on the latest efforts. “I think the contribution of both Ukrainians and Europeans to these documents is unlikely to be constructive, that’s the problem,” he said, speaking in a video posted by Russian state media journalist Pavel Zarubin. Ushakov said Moscow had not seen the latest documents but added that “if there are any relevant amendments, we will have very strong objections, since we have very clearly stated our position, which, it seems, was quite clear to the Americans.”
– New aerial strikes –
Last week, Zelensky said that Washington was still pushing it to cede land to Russia. Washington wants only Ukraine, not Russia, to withdraw its troops from parts of the eastern Donetsk region, where a demilitarized “free economic zone” would be installed as a buffer, said Zelensky. Europeans and Ukrainians are meanwhile asking the United States to provide them with “security guarantees” before Ukraine negotiates any territorial concessions, France said Friday.
Under the latest US plan, Ukraine would join the EU as early as January 2027, a senior official familiar with the matter told AFP Friday on condition of anonymity. Zelensky said on Sunday: “The most important thing is that the plan should be as fair as possible, first and foremost for Ukraine, because Russia started the war.”
The latest push in the efforts to put an end to the war came as Kyiv reported new aerial strikes. According to its air force, Russia launched 138 drones and a ballistic missile overnight. A Russian drone has hit “one of the hospitals in Kherson,” the regional administration said on Telegram, wounding two people, including a nurse. At least 11 people were wounded in the strikes on the Zaporizhzhia region, governor Ivan Fedorov said.
© 2024 AFP
