In an interview, the Ukrainian president said that if Trump managed to bring Ukraine and Russia to the negotiation table, he plans to offer Moscow an exchange of pure and simple territories, renouncing the land that Kyiv holds in The Russian region of Koursk.
“We will exchange a territory for another,” suggested Volodymyr Zelensky in an interview with The Guardian: Russia should withdraw from occupied Ukrainian territories if it wants to recover its region, taken by Ukrainian troops during an astonishingly effective and Brutally humiliating for the Kremlin six months ago.
The Ukrainian leader, however, added that he did not know which part of the territory occupied by Russia Ukraine would ask in exchange. “I don’t know, we will see. But all of our territories are important, there is no priority, “he said.
Moscow, never bowed to negotiate with her neighbor on the lands of which she launched her foray almost three years ago, rejected purely and simply any “bargaining” in her territories.
The spokesperson for the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Maria Zakharova, has split an accusing tirade towards “the neonazis who operate” in the region of Koursk, by promising them a single piece … Six feet underground.
The Duma (lower room of the Russian Parliament) reacted even more strongly by citing a well -loved book and known to the Russians, “the twelve chairs” by ILF and Petrov: “The bargaining is not in order”.
The former Russian president, currently vice-president of (rather ceremonial) Security Council, Dmitri Medvedev, who made himself known in recent years by the vitriol diatribes, has also drawn his sulphate, by qualifying the proposal of Zelensky de “Galimatias”.
Zelensky: Europe cannot guarantee the security of Ukraine without America
According to the Ukrainian president, he is ready to negotiate with Russia, but he wants Kyiv to address these negotiations in a position of strength. During the interview, Mr. Zelensky said that he would offer American companies reconstruction contracts and investment incentives. In this way, according to the media, he will try to switch the American president Donald Trump for his part, who wishes to make the parties sit at the negotiation table and put an end to the war.
Zelensky has also criticized the proposal that only European countries should provide security guarantees to Ukraine. “Voices rise to say that Europe could offer security guarantees without the Americans, and I still say no,” said the Ukrainian president during an hour -long interview with the British media in the premises of the presidential administration in Kyiv. “Security guarantees without America are not real security guarantees,” he added.
According to Zelensky, he is crucial for Ukraine’s security that US military support continues, citing the example of Patriot’s air defense systems manufactured in the United States. “Only Patriots can defend us against all types of missiles. There are other systems (Europeans) … but they cannot provide complete protection … So, even from this small example, you can see that without America, security guarantees cannot Not be complete, “he said.
At the same time, on these social networks, the Ukrainian president wondered, concerning the possible presence of the European troops of peacekeeping in Ukraine: “Perhaps the army, the presence and security of Europe Shouldn’t be discussed with Putin? Maybe it is the affair of Europe? Just like the defense of the United States is the case of the United States. ”
“Putin never asked anything, he just invaded our territory,” he continued. “So why should the continents at war today ask him for something?” Perhaps we should stop these childhood conversations? Our security guarantees are ours. Europe must defend itself because it is Europe. And the Russians are Russians. They must be given in their place ”.
Additional sources • Adaptation: Serge Duchêne