President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that Ukraine must do everything possible to ensure that the war with Russia ends next year through negotiations, commenting on the decisive moment after Donald Trump's victory in the US presidential election and Russia's great success on the battlefield.
However, Zelenskyy said that Russian President Vladimir Putin is not interested in agreeing to a peace agreement, saying that it is easier for Moscow to sit down and talk while continuing to fight.
“On our side, we must do everything so that this war will end next year, it will end with the means of speaking,” said Zelenskyy in an interview with Ukrainian radio broadcast on Saturday.
Moscow's ambassador to the UN in Geneva said on Thursday that Russia would be open to talks to end the war if they were initiated by Trump, although he added that these would have to accept “existing realities.”
Moscow uses this phrase to mean that Ukraine will have to relinquish the four regions that Russian forces have taken over and the land that Russia claims in its entirety.
Zelenskyy has repeatedly said since the full-scale invasion of Russia in February 2022 that peace will not be established until all Russian forces are expelled and all territory occupied by Moscow, including Crimea, is returned.
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However, the return to Ukraine's internationally recognized 1991 borders was not mentioned in the president's “victory plan” that he unveiled last month.
Zelenskyy said the war is likely to end quickly under Trump, who has repeatedly said during his campaign that he would quickly end the conflict, without giving details.
Zelenskyy said US law prevents him from meeting with Trump before his Jan. 20 inauguration.
“We will do everything that depends on us (to ensure the meeting). We had a really good meeting in September,” Zelenskyy said, adding that he would speak only to Trump rather than any envoy or adviser.
Zelenskyy acknowledged that the situation in eastern Ukraine was difficult and that Russia was making progress.
Moscow's military is currently facing Kurakhove, which has a thermal energy center and is only 7 kilometers away from Pokrovsk, a large city which for the most part has been one of the lynchpins of the war in Ukraine.
On the battlefields of eastern Ukraine, Russia is now advancing at a faster pace than the first days of the war in 2022.
Zelenskyy said the situation is difficult for several reasons, one of which is the year-long delay in equipping the brigades, due to the months-long delay by the US Congress last winter in approving aid to Ukraine.
However, he said that some of these groups are about to enter the competition.
“In order to stop the Russian army, new reserves will arrive, and the equipment that we have been waiting for a long time will be released,” he said.
Ukraine has sought to increase its weapons production to reduce dependence on allies. Zelenskyy said that Ukraine is now developing four different missiles, which he said are currently being tested.
