Vladimir Putin demanded international recognition of Russian sovereignty over Crimea and the Ukrainian withdrawal from the Donetsk and Luhansk regions as prerequisites for ending the war in Ukraine during his meeting with US President Donald Trump in Alaska on Friday, Reuters has reported.
Citing two anonymous sources “briefed on Moscow’s thinking” on Sunday, Reuters wrote that Russia was prepared to relinquish “tiny pockets” of occupied Ukrainian territory in the northern Sumy and northeastern Kharkiv regions, while freezing the frontlines in the southern regions of Kherson and Zaporizhzhia.
The sources also said that Putin would expect at least some of the sanctions imposed on Russia after its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 to be lifted, though it was not immediately clear whether this demand applied to US sanctions as well as European ones.
The agency noted that Putin’s demands would present “huge challenges” to Ukraine’s leadership. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who is due to travel to Washington to meet with Trump on Monday, said in a post on Saturday that Ukraine was ready to “work as productively as possible for the sake of peace”, though reactions from Ukrainian officials following the summit have been muted at best.
Ukraine has long maintained that the withdrawal of its troops from Donbas, where fighting has been ongoing since 2014, is largely inconceivable for its population. According to recent opinion polls, 52% of Ukrainians are categorically opposed to any territorial concessions in exchange for peace, while 38% described themselves as open to compromise. Furthermore, 68% of respondents rejected the Ukrainian recognition of Russia’s control over its occupied territories, while 78% opposed concessions regarding any territories still controlled by Ukraine.
Zelensky, in turn, has repeatedly stressed that he would not agree to territorial concessions, adding that Ukrainians would not “gift their land to the occupier.”
However, on Monday, an unnamed Western official told The Telegraph that Zelensky could agree to cede territory already occupied by Russia — namely, freezing the frontline where it is — in exchange for weapons deliveries and a path to NATO membership. This would once again clash with Putin’s demands, who seemed to be open to Ukraine receiving “some kind of security guarantee” but was strongly opposed to its joining NATO, according to Reuters.
Pending the outcome of the Trump-Zelensky meeting on Monday, a trilateral summit between Trump, Zelensky and Putin may be held on 22 August, Axios reported on Saturday, though this has yet to be confirmed by official sources.