Zelensky says for first time he would give up Ukrainian territory to Russia

London: Volodymyr Zelensky has said for the first time he would be willing to cede territory to Russia to end the war, in Ukraine in exchange for his country being brought under the NATO umbrella.

The Ukrainian president said support from the alliance – a political and military coalition of 32 countries from Europe and North America – would have to be offered to unoccupied parts of the country to end the “hot phase of the war”, as long as the invitation acknowledged Ukraine’s internationally recognised borders.

Volodymyr Zelenskyy speaking to Sky News.Credit: SkyNews/YouTube

His comments in an interview with UK’s Sky News on Friday underscored increased concern in Kyiv and Europe about the direction of the war and any deal that US President-elect Donald Trump might try to broker with Moscow and Zelensky.

Zelensky appeared to accept that occupied parts of eastern Ukraine would fall outside such a deal for the moment.

“If we want to stop the hot phase of the war, we need to take under the NATO umbrella the territory of Ukraine that we have under our control,” he said. “We need to do it fast. And then on the [occupied] territory of Ukraine, Ukraine can get them back in a diplomatic way.”

Donald Trump and Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky shake hands during their meeting at Trump Tower, New York back in September.Credit: AP

During the election campaign, Trump said he would end the fighting in Ukraine by inauguration day – without detailing how. There is concern in European capitals that Trump could force unfavourable terms on Ukraine, leaving it vulnerable to renewed Russian aggression or even dependence on Moscow.

Kyiv’s allies are also worried that Russian President Vladimir Putin won’t engage in talks in good faith, buying himself time to better attack Ukraine down the line and exploiting divisions between Western allies.

Zelensky said a ceasefire was needed to guarantee that Putin would “not come back” to take more Ukrainian territory. He said NATO should “immediately” cover the part of Ukraine that remains under Kyiv’s control, something he said Ukraine needs “very much, otherwise he will come back”.

He hinted during the interview that the “NATO umbrella” would not need to be full membership of NATO, rather it could mean member states, including Britain, the US, France and Germany, providing individual security guarantees to Ukraine.

Throughout the conflict, Zelensky has never said he would cede any occupied Ukrainian territory to Russia – including Crimea, which Russia occupied in February 2014 and formally annexed the following month.

In September 2022, Russia unilaterally declared its annexation of areas in and around the Ukrainian oblasts of Donetsk, Kherson, Luhansk and Zaporizhzhia following referendums that were not internationally recognised.

Almost three years on from Russia’s invasion, Ukraine’s frontline defences are in danger of crumbling. While Russian forces are reported to have suffered over 2000 casualties in a single day for the first time in the past week, Moscow’s forces have been advancing at their quickest rate since the early days of the invasion.

Russia has captured around 20 per cent of Ukraine’s territory and is advancing week by week.

Zelensky’s popularity at home is also fading, with very few Ukrainians envisioning him as their next president. A poll published this week by the Social Monitoring Centre in Kyiv found just 16 per cent would vote to re-elect him for a second term. The most comprehensive study of electoral preferences since the invasion began in 2022 also found that about 60 per cent would prefer Zelensky not to even stand for re-election.

Zelensky has so far resisted calls from the Biden administration to lower the minimum age at which men could be mobilised for the war from 25 to 18. Ukraine’s parliament ruled last year to lower the minimum age from 27 to 25 but the decision was so unpopular that Zelensky waited almost a year before giving his approval.

Retired US general Keith Kellogg, who is Trump’s pick for his Ukraine envoy, has indicated that Washington could cut arms supplies if Zelensky refused to enter ceasefire negotiations with Moscow.

In an address to media on Thursday, Putin said that Russia would only halt its attacks if Ukraine agreed to surrender territory and renounce its ambitions to join NATO, which Kyiv has described as equivalent to capitulation.

Asked if he had spoken to Trump, Zelensky said the pair spoke when he was in New York, adding: “It was very warm, good, constructive. It was a very good meeting, and it was an important first step – now we have to prepare some meetings.”

“I want to work with him directly because there are different voices from people around him. And that’s why we need not to [allow] anybody around to destroy our communication,” he said.

His comments came as the head of the UK’s Secret Intelligence Service urged the US not to allow Russia to succeed in Ukraine, warning that it would embolden other authoritarian states across the globe and jeopardise trans-Atlantic security.

“If Putin is allowed to succeed in reducing Ukraine to a vassal state, he will not stop there,” Richard Moore, who heads the UK foreign intelligence service MI6, said in a rare speech. “The cost of supporting Ukraine is well known, but the cost of not doing so would be indefinitely higher.”

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