What might a Ukraine-Russia peace deal look like?

London: Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky says his country will not accept any bilateral agreement on its fate reached by Moscow and Washington without Kyiv’s involvement, and has called for Europe to have a seat at the table to end the war.

Zelensky made the comments after US President Donald Trump’s revelation of his long conversation with Vladimir Putin, bringing the Russian president back in from the diplomatic deep freeze. The call seemed to take European leaders by surprise.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky speaks to the media at the Khmelnytskyi Nuclear Power Plant on Thursday.Credit: AP

Any peace efforts could still face stiff headwinds, including from Putin, who has shown little inclination so far to end a war he feels he is winning – even though gains by Russian forces are slow and with heavy losses.

For Ukraine, a ceasefire along the current front lines would also be a painful step, ceding control for the foreseeable future of 20 per cent of the country.

“We cannot accept it, as an independent country, any agreements [made] without us. I articulate this very clearly to our partners – any bilateral negotiations about Ukraine, not on other topics, but any bilateral talks about Ukraine without us – we will not accept,” Zelensky said as he visited a nuclear power station in western Ukraine on his way to the Munich Security Conference.

“Today it’s important that everything does not go according to Putin’s plan, in which he wants to do everything to make his negotiations bilateral [with the US].”

The Putin call and remarks by Trump’s Defence Secretary, Pete Hegseth, who said Kyiv could not join the NATO military alliance and that a return to Ukraine’s pre-2014 borders was unrealistic, have caused alarm in Europe that the White House could seek to make a deal with Russia without them.

Hegseth, however, walked back his earlier statement that a negotiated settlement was unlikely to end with Ukraine as a member of NATO. He told reporters in Brussels that negotiations would be led by Trump and that “everything is on the table”.

“In his conversations with Vladimir Putin and Zelensky, what he decides to allow or not allow is at the purview of the leader of the free world – President Trump.”

Hegseth said Zelensky would be involved in the talks but that potentially including European leaders was “not my decision”.

Asked if Ukraine would be involved in peace negotiations, Trump on Friday (AEDT) told reporters in the Oval Office: “Of course they would. I mean, they’re part of it.”

“We’ll have other people involved … lot of forks in this game, I’ll tell you what. This is a very interesting situation.”

Asked if he trusted Putin to deal in good faith, Trump replied: “I trust him on this subject. I think he’d love to see something happen.”

He also said he “would love” to have Russia return to the G7 economic forum, saying it was a mistake to expel it following its annexation of Ukraine’s Crimea region in 2014.

“Look, it’s not a question of liking Russia or not liking Russia. It was the G8 ... they should be sitting at the table. I think Putin would love to be back.”

What does Russia want?

Russian officials reiterated this week that the war would continue until all of Moscow’s goals were met, including further territorial gains and the emergence of a neutral, militarily weak Ukraine.

Russia now occupies about a fifth of Ukraine, or more than 112,000 square kilometres, and has demanded Kyiv cede more territory and be rendered permanently neutral under any peace deal.

Putin wants Ukraine to recognise Russia’s sovereignty over Crimea, the Black Sea peninsula it annexed in 2014 and which Kyiv and many Western countries consider to be occupied Ukrainian territory.

He said last month he was open to dialogue with the Trump administration and was seeking a “long-term peace based on respect for the legitimate interests of all people, all peoples who live in the region”. Many speculate he aims to seize Ukraine’s vital energy resources and rich mineral reserves, further exposing his imperial ambitions to restore Russia’s influence and territorial control over former Soviet territories.

Russian President Vladimir Putin holds a video conference at his state residence outside Moscow on Thursday.Credit: AP

He has declared that any peace deal must ensure that Ukraine gives up its NATO ambitions and withdraws its troops from the four regions – Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson – that Russia annexed in September 2022 but never fully captured.

Most US allies fear Putin won’t stop at Ukraine’s borders if he wins the war. Lithuanian Defence Minister Dovile Sakaliene warned that Russia was preparing for a wider war in Europe. She told reporters in Brussels that any deal agreed by Putin and Trump would be a “deadly trap”.

What does Ukraine want?

Ukraine wants Russia to withdraw from captured territory, although two senior officials suggested late last year that “nothing is more important” than security guarantees to prevent Moscow from attacking again.

Funeral workers lower the coffins of Kateryna Zapishnya, 38, Diana Zapishnya, 12, Danyil Zapishnyi, 8, and Serhii Zapishnyi, 40, who were killed on February 1 by a Russian strike on a residential building in Poltava, Ukraine.Credit: AP

Zelensky first said in November he was prepared to swap territory with Russia in any potential peace negotiations. According to Ukraine’s president, Kyiv’s priority in meetings with the US was the development of a plan “to stop Putin”.

“I think it’s only fair to talk to the Russians after that,” he said, adding that he wanted European partners involved in negotiations.

In an interview with the Guardian earlier this week, Zelensky said he was prepared to offer to give up land that Ukraine captured in Kursk, in Russia’s south-west, in a surprise offensive in August. It controls about 450 square kilometres there.

“We will swap one territory for another,” Zelensky said, but added that he did not know which part of Russian-occupied land Ukraine would ask for in return. “I don’t know, we will see. But all our territories are important, there is no priority,” he said.

The Kremlin has denounced that idea, adding that Russia “had never discussed and would not discuss the exchange of its territory”.

A Kyiv International Institute of Sociology survey last month found 38 per cent of Ukrainians would be willing to give up territory for peace while 51 per cent said no land concessions should be made.

What does the United States want?

Trump has said American support for Ukraine has a $US500 billion ($792 billion) price tag worth of mineral riches.

In an interview with Fox News, he said the US should get a slice of Ukraine’s vast natural resources as compensation for the hundreds of billions it has spent on military aid to help Kyiv resist Russia’s full-scale invasion.

President Donald Trump speaks to reporters in the Oval Office on Thursday as Commerce Secretary nominee Howard Lutnick watches on.Credit: AP

“I told them [Ukraine] that I want the equivalent like $500 billion worth of rare earth. And they’ve essentially agreed to do that so at least we don’t feel stupid,” Trump said.

Ukraine holds huge deposits of critical elements and minerals, from lithium to titanium, which are vital to manufacturing modern technologies. It also has vast coal reserves, as well as oil, gas and uranium, but much of this is in territories under Russian control.

In a speech in Brussels, Hegseth called on European nations to shoulder more of NATO’s defence spending, adding that Trump would not allow anyone to turn “Uncle Sam into uncle sucker”.

US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth speaks at NATO headquarters in Brussels on Thursday. Credit: AP

He said the US attempts to negotiate peace between Ukraine and Russia were “certainly not a betrayal” of the Ukrainian soldiers who have been fighting against the invasion.

Senior Ukrainian and Western officials have told media outlets they believe Trump and Putin would probably try to secure a ceasefire by one of two significant upcoming dates: Easter, which the Orthodox and Catholic churches will both celebrate on April 20 this year; or May 9, when Russia celebrates Soviet victory over Nazi Germany.

What about a peacekeeping force for when the war ends?

Last year, French President Emmanuel Macron floated the idea of a peacekeeping force in Ukraine to guarantee Russia would leave it alone.

Reports at the time put this proposed force at 40,000 troops with contributions from several foreign countries, although Zelensky has suggested 200,000 would be needed, including troops from the US.

French President Emmanuel Macron, left, and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi at Marseille Provence airport in France on Wednesday.Credit: AP

The British and the Nordic states support the idea of a Europe-led initiative of sending tens of thousands of troops in the event of a ceasefire deal. However, Germany and others are opposed.

The Baltic States and Poland are concerned the proposed mission could divert much-needed resources from NATO’s border states with Russia, leaving them exposed.

Germany’s outgoing Chancellor Olaf Scholz has said talk of his country joining the effort was “premature and inappropriate”. However, Australia would not rule out participation.

Trump has said European soldiers should maintain the peace in Ukraine, not American soldiers, despite the US’s membership of NATO.

Diplomatic sources believe a United Nations peacekeeping force would be wiser and more likely to secure Putin’s agreement. This could involve some 100,000 peacekeepers positioned inside Ukraine and Russia and would not require direct US involvement. It could involve Indian and Chinese troops.

What about Ukraine’s bid to join NATO?

NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte said in Brussels there was “total agreement” among allies that Ukraine must be empowered in talks rather than being “forced into an agreement” it does not accept.

But he added that Ukraine had never been promised it would become a NATO member if it forged a peace deal with Russia.

“We have to make sure that Vladimir Putin never, ever tries again to attack Ukraine, that is crucial ... but it has never been a promise to Ukraine that as part of peace deal they would be part of NATO,” he said.

Rutte said he expected European nations to take on more of the financial burden of military aid to Ukraine as Trump’s administration seeks to limit its funding.

Other Western allies said the possibility of Ukraine joining NATO needed to stay on the table.

‘Putin will have won’: What the experts say

Carnegie Russia Eurasia Centre director Alexander Gabuev said the situation looked more favourable for Putin than at any point during the war over the past three years.

“If the US just unilaterally ends its military and diplomatic support, as well as intelligence sharing, then Ukraine will be in a very tough position,” he said. “And it’ll be hard to get out of it even if the Europeans get more involved.”

Carlo Masala, professor of international politics at the Bundeswehr University, described the Trump and Putin phone call as an “apocalyptic scenario”.

“The Europeans will have no place at the negotiating table. They will have to accept the result. And unfortunately, it looks as if this also applies to Ukraine,” he said.

“Putin will clap his hands. Putin will have won this war. He has managed to get the Americans to withdraw from this conflict.”

Stefan Wolff, professor of international security at the University of Birmingham, said he thought there would be a ceasefire along the line of contact at the time.

“There may be some adjustments and possibly a buffer zone,” Wolff told the Kyiv Independent. “But I cannot see any major territorial changes or any formal recognition of the status quo.”

With agencies

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