Despite the optimism expressed by Donald Trump after the meeting held this Sunday in his residence in Florida with the president of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelenskythe idea left by the meeting between the two is that the peace agreement with Russia – what the Americans have been seeking for more than a year – not only is not ready to be signed but, in addition, it may still take a long time to achieve it.
“I had a great conversation with Zelensky,” Trump commented at the press conference following the meeting. “We are 90% towards an agreement,” the Ukrainian leader said.
US President Donald Trump with Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelensky
If we read the 20 points of the new peace proposal – the one initially agreed between the United States and Russia had 28 – and look at the points on which there is still no agreement, the percentage proposed by Zelensky is correct: only a few points remain to be resolved.
The problem is that these two points are not anecdotal. Quite the contrary. What’s more: one of them – the one affecting the Donbass region – is vital for both contenders. For strategic but also symbolic reasons.
And, apart from the annexation of Crimea by Russia in 2014, the war which has opposed the two countries since then finds its origin precisely there: in the Donbass.
Zelensky, experts say, cannot abandon what Ukraine still retains – 30% of the territory – without risking facing a citizen or even military revolt. And Putin, as experts like Marc Galeotti According to EL ESPAÑOL, he can only sign a peace that he can sell as a victory in Russia. Which would be very difficult with a pact that does not envisage total domination of Donbass.
The other point on which there is still no agreement concerns the Zaporizhia nuclear power plant. An installation located on the banks of the Dnieper, very close to the front line, but which has been in the hands of Russia since March 2022. kyiv would like to regain control of it to prevent, among other things, the Kremlin from using it against Ukraine.
Security guarantees
On another aspect that has always worried Zelensky, that of the security guarantees provided by the United States to prevent Russia from resuming its attacks against Ukraine once peace is signed, progress does indeed seem to have been made.
As shown Christopher Millercorrespondent of Financial Times In kyiv and someone with direct access to the Ukrainian president, the United States would have offered a 15-year security guarantee. Yet the Ukrainians want three times as much time to deter future Russian aggression, or at least twice as much time.
“The Ukrainian president asked for a guarantee of up to 50 years,” Miller wrote in the column he later sent to his newspaper. “Zelensky reportedly told Trump that 15 years would be too short to deter Russia in a conflict that began with the 2014 annexation of Crimea.”
“I also told him that we would like to consider the possibility of 30, 40 or 50 years,” Zelensky added during the interview with the journalist. As of this writing, the White House has not commented on the matter.
Alleged attack on Putin’s residence
After the meeting in Florida and the press conference that followed, one question remained unanswered above all others: what will be Putin’s next step? Speculation suggested two possible paths: that of participating in the negotiations by seeking to gain as much as possible or that of trying to boycott them.
Coincidentally, this Monday, the day after the meeting between Trump and Zelensky and the good words that the former said towards the latter, Russia accused Ukraine of having attacked one of Putin’s residences with drones.
“This is a definitive step towards a policy of state terrorism,” Kremlin sources said. They also warned that the attack forced Russia to “reconsider its negotiating position.”
Zelensky, for his part, assured that this alleged attack is “a complete fabrication intended to justify new attacks against Ukraine.” And also intended to justify to Trump that he did not want to continue the negotiations and, therefore, that he was directing his anger in the other direction.
In fact, as the Russian news agency reported a few hours ago TASS quoting a government advisor named Yuri UshakovAfter being informed of the attack, Trump reportedly appeared “shocked and outraged” by the “senseless” nature of the matter.
Yuri Ushakov and Vladimir Putin during the meeting with Steve Witkoff, their backs turned in this photo.
Reuters/Sputnik
“Thank God we didn’t give them Tomahawks,” the White House tenant reportedly added, referring to the long-range missiles that kyiv had requested from Washington a few months ago.
Recall, the day after the alleged attack on Putin’s residence, that this weekend, a few hours before the meeting between Trump and Zelensky in Florida, the Kremlin ordered the launch of 500 drones and 40 missiles – including those of the Kinzhal class – against kyiv. Result: one of the most serious attacks that the Ukrainian capital has suffered since the start of the war.
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