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Ukraine is to begin negotiations with the US next week over ending the war set off by Russia’s 2022 invasion, after days of tension between Kyiv and Washington.
Volodymyr Zelenskyy confirmed the talks as he wrapped up a summit on Thursday with EU leaders, who rallied round the Ukrainian president and pledged to increase their own defence capabilities.
“The war must be stopped as soon as possible, and Ukraine is ready to work 24/7 together with partners in America and Europe for peace,” Zelenskyy said on a post on Telegram after the Brussels summit.
“Next week, on Monday, I am scheduled to visit Saudi Arabia to meet with the Crown Prince [Mohammed bin Salman]. After that, my team will remain in Saudi Arabia to work with American partners. Ukraine is most interested in peace.”
News of the meeting followed a week in which Zelenskyy clashed with US President Donald Trump at the White House and the US suspended military aid and intelligence support to Kyiv.
The Trump administration has previously held bilateral talks with Russia, excluding Ukraine and other European states.
Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff said the meeting with Ukraine would seek to agree a framework for “a peace agreement and an initial ceasefire”.
The talks will be focused on the minerals deal that the US has struck with Ukraine as well as a possible ceasefire.
Zelenskyy added that the “first priority” was to “establish and fully monitor” a cessation of hostilities by air and at sea, including a moratorium striking energy facilities and civilian infrastructure, an idea first floated by France.
The Ukrainian president, who has come under intense pressure from Washington to agree to an immediate ceasefire, described such steps as “a prologue to a broader and more comprehensive settlement”.
Pete Hegseth, the US defence secretary, said that Washington’s freeze on supplying weapons to Kyiv was a “pause, pending a true commitment to a path to peace”, adding that the White House was “very encouraged by the signs we’re seeing”.
However, the rift between the US and Ukraine has alarmed European leaders, whose summit on Thursday was intended as a riposte to the hostile treatment of Zelenskyy by the Trump administration.
“Dear Volodymyr, we have been with you since day one,” said António Costa, European Council president, who chaired the leaders’ summit. “We continue to be with you now, and we will continue in the future.”
French President Emmanuel Macron said European leaders were against a “false truce” in Ukraine and united behind the need for an enforceable ceasefire and lasting settlement.
But Hungary’s pro-Russia premier Viktor Orbán refused to support the promise of “enduring” support by all but one of the bloc’s leaders statement, forcing the other 26 leaders to issue a text without him.
The summit statement nodded to increased military support for Ukraine and the readiness of states to “contribute to security guarantees based on their respective competences and capabilities” to a post-conflict state.
“It doesn’t matter in what form we state our support for Ukraine, just that we do,” said one diplomat involved in the talks. “At this particular juncture, it would be disastrous not to.”
A separate statement, agreed by all 27 EU leaders, endorsed new defence funding initiatives proposed by the commission. These include changes to the bloc’s debt and deficit rules to exempt an increase in defence spending, and an instrument that would provide €150bn in loans to capitals to spend on military capabilities.
Both ideas were given broad political support, but the details of both are yet to be negotiated ahead of approval by governments.
“Europe must become more sovereign, more responsible for its own defence and better equipped to act and deal autonomously with immediate and future challenges and threats with a 360° approach,” the 27 leaders said in the statement, which did not refer to the US.
The loan instrument, targeted at specific capabilities including air defence and drone systems, would be “as flexible as possible with as few strings attached”, one EU official said, to ensure fast adoption. It would use existing Nato criteria to ensure it was being correctly spent, they added.
The structure enables the commission to get around an EU treaty ban on direct military expenditure by instead boosting the European defence industry’s output. Some of that production could be used to arm Ukraine.
Additional reporting by Alice Hancock in Trowbridge and Fabrice Deprez in Kyiv
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