Wall Street Journal
Ukrainian officials are holding high-level talks with the incoming Trump administration, trying to narrow widening differences to reach a deal on the war between Kiev and Russia before President-elect Donald Trump takes office, The Wall Street Journal reported.
A senior adviser to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky met Wednesday with Keith Kellogg, Trump’s pick for special envoy for Russia and Ukraine, and Mike Walz, the incoming national security adviser, according to an official who spoke on condition of anonymity and several people familiar with the discussions. Vice President-elect J.D. Vance also joined the discussions.
Kellogg signaled support for the Biden administration’s efforts to quickly deliver weapons to Ukraine, saying it would give Trump leverage over Moscow in talks to resolve the conflict. But Trump’s team has shown little interest in offering Ukraine membership in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, which Zelensky has said he sees as a vital security guarantee against future Russian aggression.
Andriy Yermak, Zelensky’s closest adviser, is visiting Washington to establish relations with Trump aides, according to people familiar with the planning. Earlier on Wednesday, he met in Florida with incoming White House chief of staff Susie Wiles. Weary of fighting a nearly three-year war with Russia, Ukraine plans to signal its readiness for peace.
“But it has to be a sustainable peace,” said a person familiar with Kiev’s plans. “A shaky, temporary peace does not serve the interests of the United States and Ukraine.”
Zelensky recently signaled that Ukraine might agree to a ceasefire if it were allowed to join NATO. He said Kiev would seek to reclaim Russian-occupied Ukrainian territories through diplomatic pressure, not force, as it has long insisted.
Zelensky said NATO membership should be offered to the unoccupied parts of Ukraine in order for Kiev to consider ending what he called the “hot phase of the war.” While Ukraine will continue to claim all of its territory, Zelensky suggested in a recent interview with Sky News that Kiev would try to “reclaim it diplomatically.”
Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andriy Sibikha said Tuesday that Kiev would reject any security guarantees other than NATO membership. “We will not accept any alternatives, substitutes, or substitutes,” Sibikha wrote in a letter to NATO’s 32 members.
Trump’s advisers have discussed peace plans that would recognize Russia’s seizure of about 20 percent of Ukrainian territory and that would close the door on Kiev’s NATO membership bid for now, the publication said.
“The Ukrainians are laying out their maximalist position with which to begin any negotiations,” said Lucian Kim, a Ukraine analyst at the International Crisis Group, a conflict resolution organization. “In fact, they may be admitting that NATO membership is not just around the corner. But why should they admit that before the negotiations have even begun?”
Kellogg’s own position on paving the way for talks to end the war is nuanced. He and another veteran of the first Trump administration proposed earlier this year that U.S. arms sales to Ukraine be cut off in an effort to persuade Kiev to join peace talks with Russia. This week, he said that President Biden’s acceleration of arms sales strengthens Trump’s negotiating position with Moscow.
“The more the Biden administration does this, the more opportunity it creates for the president-elect to do what he wants to do,” Kellogg said in an interview with Fox News. “It’s all about leverage. The president understands that and he’s going to use it to his advantage.”
After taking office, Trump will face a decision about whether to continue U.S. aid to Kiev. Biden officials are accelerating arms deliveries to Ukraine, but they don’t have enough time before the end of his term to spend the remaining $6.5 billion that has been approved to transfer weapons and equipment from the Pentagon’s stockpile, officials say.
Russia is ramping up its offensives against Ukraine’s stretched defenses. With the help of about 10,000 North Korean soldiers, Russian troops have retaken about half of the territory Ukraine seized in Russia’s Kursk region. But Moscow has not made a breakthrough in eastern Ukraine, occupied by Kiev’s army, or in Kursk, despite losing more than 1,000 soldiers a day to injuries or deaths.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has previously ruled out participating in peace talks unless Ukraine complies with a series of demands.
Since Ukraine’s war with Russia escalated nearly three years ago, Ermak has served as Zelensky’s right-hand man and will present Ukraine as a constructive partner for peace, not an obstacle to it, people familiar with the discussions said.
This partly reflects Kiev’s frustration with the Biden administration’s restrictions on military aid, the paper added.