Ukraine and its European allies have been buoyed by Donald Trump’s promise of security guarantees for Kyiv to help end the Ukraine war but face many unanswered questions, including how Russia will respond to diplomatic developments.
Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy welcomed Monday’s extraordinary summit at the White House with Mr Trump as a “major step forward” towards ending Europe’s deadliest conflict in 80 years and towards setting up a trilateral meeting with Russia’s president Vladimir Putin and the US president in the coming weeks.
Flanked by the leaders of allies including Germany, France and Britain at the summit, Mr Zelenskiy’s warm rapport with Trump contrasted sharply with their disastrous meeting at the Oval Office in February.
But beyond the optics, the path to a lasting peace remains deeply uncertain and Mr Zelenskiy may be forced to make painful compromises to end a war that analysts say has killed or wounded more than one million people.
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Despite the temporary sense of relief in Kyiv, there was no let-up in the fighting. Russia launched 270 drones and 10 missiles in an overnight attack on Ukraine, the Ukrainian air force said, the largest this month. The energy ministry said Russia had targeted energy facilities in the central Poltava region, home to Ukraine’s only oil refinery, causing big fires.
“The good news is that there was no blow-up [at the White House]. Trump didn’t demand Ukrainian capitulation nor cut off support. The mood music was positive and the transatlantic alliance lives on,” John Foreman, a former British defence attache to Kyiv and Moscow, told Reuters.
“On the downside, there is a great deal of uncertainty about the nature of security guarantees and what exactly the US has in mind.”
Mr Zelenskiy said on Tuesday his officials were working on the content of the security guarantees.
Russia has made no explicit commitment to a meeting between Mr Putin and Mr Zelenskiy. Foreign minister Sergei Lavrov said on Tuesday that Moscow did not reject any formats for discussing the peace process in Ukraine but that any meeting of national leaders “must be prepared with utmost thoroughness”.
Mr Putin has warned that Russia will not tolerate troops from the Nato alliance on Ukrainian soil. He has also shown no sign of backing down from demands for territory, including land not under Russia’s military control, following his own summit talks with Mr Trump last Friday in Alaska.
[ Ukraine and Europe steer Trump peace bid away from immediate disaster for KyivOpens in new window ]
Mr Trump has not specified what form US security guarantees could take, and backed away from insisting that Russia agree to a ceasefire before any peace negotiations kick off in earnest.
The US president has also told Ukraine to forget about regaining control of Crimea, which was annexed by Russia in 2014, or joining Nato.
“It is hard to imagine there being any deal today that is acceptable and that respects the red lines of the Ukrainians and Europe as well as the red lines of the Russians,” said Matthias Matthijs, senior fellow for Europe at the Council on Foreign Relations.
Europe’s dealings with Mr Trump are similar to the fraught negotiations on tariffs, Mr Matthijs said: “Having avoided the worst outcomes, they come to some sort of agreement. It’s better than they feared, but it’s always worse than the status quo.”
Former Russian president Dmitry Medvedev said Mr Zelenskiy and his allies had “failed to outplay” Trump.
“Europe thanked & sucked up to him,” Mr Medvedev wrote on X.
[ Four key takeaways from Trump’s White House summit on UkraineOpens in new window ]
The last direct talks between Russia and Ukraine took place in Turkey in July while Mr Putin also declined Mr Zelenskiy’s public invitation to meet him face-to-face in May.
“President Trump has now opened the door to the negotiating room for him, and Putin must now enter it,” German foreign minister Johann Wadephul told the Deutschlandfunk radio broadcaster. If not, he said, sanctions must be intensified.
On what security guarantees could be offered to Ukraine: “We are working flat out to specify this.”
Ukraine’s allies were holding talks in the so-called “Coalition of the Willing” format on Tuesday to discuss the way forward.
Nato secretary general Mark Rutte, who also attended Monday’s talks, said Nato membership for Ukraine was not under discussion but that there was a discussion on “Article 5”-type security guarantees for the country.
Article 5 of Nato’s founding treaty enshrines the principle of collective defence, in which an attack on any of its 32 members is considered an attack on all.
“There is, of course, the question of what Russia will accept. But also, what western countries are willing, and able, to do for Ukraine,” said a note by Eurointelligence.
Orysia Lutsevych, a research fellow at Chatham House, said the worst case scenario “of Trump selling Ukraine out to Putin was avoided” at Monday’s talks, but she added:
“A bilateral with Putin is dangerous for Zelenskiy. Even if it happens, which is highly unlikely, Putin will blame him for obstructing peace, being unreasonable. In such a case, the question is: who Donald Trump will trust and blame for his failed peacemaking efforts.”
