By Euronews
Published on
•Updated
Ukraine and the US have reached a consensus on several key issues aimed at ending Russia’s nearly four-year war, but territorial control in Ukraine’s eastern regions and the management of the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant remain unresolved, Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said.
Zelenskyy spoke as the US shared the latest 20-point plan with Russian negotiators. A response is expected from Moscow on Wednesday, the Ukrainian president said.
The future of Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk and Luhansk regions, known together as the Donbas, remains at the heart of the talks, in what Zelenskyy described as “the most difficult point”.
Russia continues to assert maximalist demands, insisting that Ukraine relinquish the remaining territory in Donbas that it has not captured — an ultimatum that Kyiv has rejected.
In a bid to facilitate compromise, Washington has proposed transforming these areas into free economic zones. Ukraine is demanding the demilitarisation of the area and the presence of an international force to ensure stability, Zelenskyy told journalists in a briefing.
The future management of Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant (ZNPP), the largest plant in Europe which remains under Russian occupation, is another contentious issue. The US is proposing a consortium with Ukraine and Russia, with each party having an equal stake in the enterprise.
But Zelenskyy countered with a joint-venture proposal between the US and Ukraine, under which Washington would decide how to allocate its share, assuming it would go to Moscow.
“We did not reach a consensus with the American side on the territory of the Donetsk region and on the ZNPP,” Zelenskyy said. “But we have significantly brought most of the positions closer together. In principle, all other consensus in this agreement has been found between us and them.”
Ukraine is also proposing that the occupied city of Enerhodar, which is connected to the Zaporizhzhia power plant, be a demilitarised free economic zone, Zelenskyy said. This point required 15 hours of discussions with the US, he said.
Zelenskyy said billions in investment are needed to restart the plant, including restoring the adjacent dam.
Free economic zone compromise
The two issues will likely remain major sticking points in the talks.
Zelenskyy said: “We are in a situation where the Russians want us to leave the Donetsk region, and the Americans are trying to find a way so that it is ‘not a way out’ — because we are against leaving — they want to find a demilitarised zone or a free economic zone in this, that is, a format that can provide for the views of both sides.”
The draft states that the contact line, which cuts across five Ukrainian regions, should be frozen once the agreement is signed.
Ukraine’s stance is that any attempt to establish a free economic zone must be ratified by referendum, underscoring that the Ukrainian people ultimately hold the decision-making power, Zelenskyy said.
This process will require 60 days, he added, during which hostilities should cease to allow it to proceed.
More difficult discussions would involve determining how far troops would need to be deployed to withdraw, per Ukraine’s proposal, and where international forces would be stationed. Ultimately, “people can choose: this ending suits us or not,” Zelenskyy said.
The draft also proposes that Russian forces withdraw from the Dnipropetrovsk, Mykolaiv, Sumy and Kharkiv regions, and that international forces be deployed along the contact line to monitor the agreement’s implementation.
“Since there is no faith in the Russians, and they have repeatedly broken their promises, today’s contact line is turning into a line of a de facto free economic zone, and international forces should be there to guarantee that no one will enter there under any guise — neither ‘little green men’ nor Russian military disguised as civilians,” Zelenskyy said.
Kyiv has previously signed ceasefire deals with Moscow following Russia’s initial invasion of eastern Ukraine in 2014 and its annexation of Crimea.
The 2014 and 2015 Minsk agreements called for an immediate ceasefire in eastern Ukraine, the withdrawal of heavy weapons from the front line, and the restoration of Ukrainian government control over its border with Russia.
Under the initial deal, Russia was to withdraw all foreign armed formations including its mercenary groups and military equipment from Ukrainian territory, a commitment Moscow failed to honour, sending troops as early as 2015, which triggered the second agreement, Minsk II.
The two agreements collapsed before Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022.