President Volodymyr Zelensky on Tuesday said that Kremlin strongman Vladimir Putin scored a “personal victory” by getting invited to talks with American president Donald Trump in the US, and promised that the Ukrainian Armed Forces will not retreat from the Russian-occupied Donbas region, as Trump suggested.
Speaking to reporters in Kyiv, Zelensky said, “First, [Putin] will meet on US territory, which I consider his personal victory. Second, he is coming out of isolation because he is meeting on US territory. Third, with this meeting, he has somehow postponed sanctions,” Zelensky said.
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The United States has imposed heavy sanctions on Russian individuals and entities, but it is not a signatory to the International Criminal Court’s Rome Statute, meaning American authorities are not obligated to arrest Putin on US soil for his outstanding warrants for war crimes. (By contrast, Mongolia is party to the statute, but authorities there failed to handcuff him when the Russian autocrat visited last September.)
In recent days, Trump has alluded to “land-swapping” to build a truce, though Ukraine has little Russian territory to “swap” in exchange for its own land.
On Monday, the US president insisted that Ukraine must accept the redrawing of its borders to achieve peace, but claimed that he would try to get “some very prime territory” back for Ukraine.
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Zelensky said such an action would pave the way for “a third war” and a future offensive on the Zaporizhzhia and Dnipropetrovsk regions, as well as the city of Kharkiv.
“We will not leave Donbas,” Zelensky said. “We cannot do that. Everyone forgets the first part — our territories are illegally occupied. For the Russians, Donbas is a springboard for a future new offensive. If we leave Donbas of our own accord or under pressure, we will start a third war.
“Why? Crimea was definitely a springboard for an offensive against the South of our country. Donbas was definitely a springboard for not sparing Ukrainian citizens, not using our own, not mobilizing (sorry to say this, but that’s how it is), and turning over the separatists to the Russian army,” Zelensky emphasized.
The summit, scheduled to take place in the Alaskan city of Anchorage on Friday, will be the first between a sitting US and Russian president since 2021, when then-US President Joe Biden met with Putin in Geneva, Switzerland.
The agenda at the time focused on nuclear arms control and human rights. While Russia had already illegally annexed Crimea in 2014, its full-scale invasion of Ukraine did not start until February 2022.
Zelensky said he had received a “signal” from US envoy to Moscow Steve Witkoff that Russia might agree to a ceasefire in Anchorage.
“This was the first [such] signal from [the Kremlin],” Zelensky said.
The White House, meanwhile, confirmed on Monday that the meeting was planned after Putin requested it.
White House spokesperson Karoline Leavitt said the aim “for the president is to walk away with a better understanding of how we can end this war”.
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