WASHINGTON — London discussions between the US, United Kingdom, Ukraine, France and Germany ended Wednesday without agreement on the terms of a potential peace deal — but with promises to keep talking, as Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky again insisted ceding Crimea to Russia was a non-starter.
“We reaffirmed Ukraine’s commitment to peace efforts led by US President Donald Trump and our willingness to move forward toward a comprehensive, just, and lasting peace,” Kyiv Minister of Foreign Affairs Andrii Sybiha posted to X after the meetings broke up. “We will continue our regular dialogue.”
The suggestion that talks will keep going comes after the Trump administration threatened to abandon US efforts to facilitate negotiations between Ukraine and Russia, the latter of which has refused to agree to the president’s proposed cease-fire for more than a month.
The White House affirmed that US involvement in the talks would not end Wednesday, despite the earlier threats.
“Not by the end of the day today,” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters when asked whether Trump would be willing to walk away, “but the president has maintained that his frustration is growing and he needs to see this thing come to an end.”
While expressing openness to further talks, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky made clear that Kyiv will not consider any proposals that involve the recognition of Ukraine’s Crimean peninsula as sovereign Russian land, noting that “emotions have run high today” over the US’ suggestion to do so.
“Ukraine will always act in accordance with its Constitution and we are absolutely sure that our partners in particular the USA will act in line with its strong decisions,” Zelensky posted to X, referencing Kyiv’s post-Soviet founding document that bars the recognition of any part of its territory as Russian.
Still, the Ukraine president said all participants in the Wednesday discussions “expressed their views and respectfully received each other’s positions.”
Here’s what Russia and Ukraine each get in Trump’s ‘final offer’ peace deal
What Russia gets
- Formal US recognition of Ukraine’s Crimea peninsula as Russian territory — a major departure from Washington’s longstanding Welles doctrine, which refuses to acknowledge annexed territory as belonging to the seizing power.
- “De facto” recognition of Russia’s occupation of four regions in eastern Ukraine, meaning the US would acknowledge Moscow controls the Luhansk, Donetsk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia oblasts while formally considering them Ukrainian land.
- A pledge that the US would not support Ukraine becoming a member of NATO.
- Lifting sanctions to boost Russia’s economy, which has struggled throughout its war on Ukraine.
- Opportunities for more economic cooperation with the US, especially in the energy and industrial fields.
What Ukraine gets
- Assistance from European military forces as “a robust security guarantee” following a cease-fire. The US would not be involved in this measure.
- Russia would return a small portion of Ukraine’s Kharkiv oblast currently occupied by Moscow.
- Navigation rights in the Dnieper River, which runs along the front lines.
- Assistance in post-war rebuilding, though it is unclear from where that funding would come.
“It’s important that each side was not just a participant but contributed meaningfully,” he said. “The American side shared its vision. Ukraine and other Europeans presented their inputs. And we hope that it is exactly such joint work that will lead to lasting peace. We are grateful to partners.”
While the post did not mention the suggestion that the US could recognize Crimea as Russian, Zelensky included a screenshot of a declaration from Trump’s first term that pledged the US would “maintain” longstanding policy not to recognize annexed territory as Russian.
“As we did in the Welles Declaration in 1940, the United States reaffirms as policy its refusal to recognize the Kremlin’s claims of sovereignty over territory seized by force in contravention of international law,” then-Secretary of State Mike Pompeo wrote in 2018, referencing the 85-year policy.
Zelensky’s post came after both Trump and Leavitt chided the Ukrainian president for speaking out about Kyiv’s total refusal to support the Crimea recognition.
“Unfortunately, President Zelensky has been trying to litigate this peace negotiation in the press, and that’s unacceptable to the president,” Leavitt told reporters. “These should be closed door negotiations.”
Trump, meanwhile, called out Zelensky’s comments to the Wall Street Journal that Ukraine would “not legally recognize the occupation of Crimea,” and denied that it was “even a point of discussion.”
“It’s inflammatory statements like Zelenskyy’s that makes it so difficult to settle this War,” Trump wrote to Truth Social. “He has nothing to boast about!”
Still, Kyiv’s Wednesday discussions with special presidential envoy Keith Kellogg involved “a constructive exchange of views on the path to peace,” Sybiha wrote on X.
“Ukraine wants the war to end more than anyone else in the world,” he said. “We are committed to working together to achieve this goal.”
Russia, meanwhile, has not said whether it would meet with US officials this week to discuss the proposed peace plan after the Kremlin on Tuesday blasted Trump’s push to end the war within days.
“The issue of the [Ukrainian] settlement is extremely complex, of course, so it is hardly possible to set some hard deadlines and try to rush the resolution of the conflict into a shortened timeframe,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told Russian outlet VGTRK. “This would be an exercise in futility.”
For now, it remains unclear whether the US actually will abandon the talks, a move which a senior US described to The Post as a major reubke to Russia, given the administration’s diplomatic tack with the Kremlin.
Should Trump walk away from the discussions, he would do so after issuing tough punishments to Ukraine but none for Russia.
Last month, the US briefly paused intelligence sharing and military aid to Ukraine in an effort to bring them to the negotiating table.
Meanwhile, Trump has not followed through on multiple threats to tighten US sanctions on Russia — though he offered to eliminate them if Moscow agrees to his peace plan.
