Russia has no intention of giving up control over the Ukrainian territories it has seized, even though they are not considered Russian under international law, a difficult situation that will require further negotiations to resolve, said Keith Kellogg, team Trump’s special envoy to Ukraine.
In an interview with Fox News, as quoted by Ukrainska Pravda, Kellogg said that Russia effectively controls the Luhansk region, while it holds only parts of the Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, and Kherson regions. According to him, this raises some important questions:
“So the question is now, what does this look like? What do the territorial gains look like?” he said.
Kellogg said that regardless of how the war ends, it is important to clearly distinguish between de facto control and legal ownership.
Russia continues to hold the occupied territories and does not intend to give them up, yet from a legal standpoint, these lands still belong to Ukraine.
“And then you have to go back to what we call either de facto or de jure,” said Kellogg. “De facto meaning, okay, you physically occupy the territory, they’re not going to move off it. But you don’t go to de jure and say, you’ve totally annexed it, we give it to you as a part of Russia. Those are the discussions that are going to have to take place.”
Kellogg said reaching a political solution first requires understanding each side’s position, then seeking a compromise that at least partially satisfies both Ukraine and Russia, while understanding that neither side will get everything it wants.
“I think what you have to do is get what I would call term sheets. What do the Ukrainians want? What do the Russians want? Then you kind of merge them and say, OK, what is going to work for both sides? Do you get to an agreeable situation? I think that’s going to be the important step, is what do they both want? What do they both not want? And by the way, neither side is going to be totally satisfied, because both sides are not going to get totally what they want.”
Last month Kyiv Post also interviewed Kellogg’s daughter Meaghan Mobbs in Kyiv, where she divulged her volunteer work in Ukraine and her relationship with Kellogg.
In her view, American support for Ukraine is not just a strategic necessity but a moral obligation.
“The US has to show up for Ukraine in the same way that I imagine Ukraine would show up for the US and has. The Ukrainians fought beside us in Iraq. So, I think there’s an obligation there.”