According to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, US security guarantees for his country have been fully agreed.
“The document is 100 percent ready, and we are waiting for our partners to confirm the date and place of its signing,” he said Sunday, January 25, at a news conference in Vilnius after meeting Lithuanian President Gitanas Nauseda.
The security guarantees document will then be sent to the US Congress and Ukraine’s Verkhovna Rada for ratification, the Ukrainian president added.
Zelensky also said a “20-point plan and outstanding issues” were discussed at three-way talks in Abu Dhabi.
He said there were “a lot of such issues,” and that the list “has gotten shorter.”
He stressed that Ukraine’s position on the Donbas has not changed.
“We are fighting for our own state, our own; we are not fighting on someone else’s territory, so what questions can there be for us?” the Ukrainian president said.
He said the administration of US President Donald Trump, which is seeking a peace settlement in Ukraine, is trying to find a compromise between Ukraine’s and Russia’s fundamentally different positions. “We have agreed to engage in a three-way format. These are early steps, perhaps to find that very compromise. But for a compromise, all sides have to be ready to compromise — including the American side,” he added.
Lithuania’s president accused Russia of ducking its obligations to secure a lasting, just peace in Ukraine. Russia is also rejecting calls for a ceasefire, Nauseda noted.
He also said he is confident Ukraine should join the European Union by 2030. Ukraine’s EU entry is a strategic interest for Lithuania and a step toward stability across the region, he said.
First direct Ukraine-Russia talks mediated by the US
The first direct talks between representatives of Russia and Ukraine, mediated by the United States and aimed at ending Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, were held in Abu Dhabi on January 23 and 24.
He said the discussion focused on potential parameters to end the war and the security guarantees Ukraine would need to make that possible.
The next round is set for February 1.
Shortly before the talks began, Moscow reaffirmed its maximal demand that Ukrainian forces withdraw from all of Donbas, including areas that were not previously under Russian control.
After the first day of talks, Russia carried out another large-scale missile-and-drone attack on Ukraine.
Kyiv said the Russian strikes were aimed in part at undermining the peace process.
