President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that Kyiv has accepted Washington's offer to hold another round of talks between Ukrainian and American delegations in the United States next week to end Russia's war against Ukraine. According to him, this meeting is scheduled for February 17 or 18, but it is not yet known whether the Russian side will be present.
He said this in a comment to Bloomberg.
According to the head of state, it is not yet known whether the Russian side will agree to negotiations in the United States. He specified that the main topic of the delegations' meeting will be the creation of a free economic zone in Donbas.
“Neither side is thrilled with the idea of a free economic zone — neither the Russians nor us. We have different views on this issue. And the agreement was this: let's return to discussions at the next meeting about what this might look like,” Zelensky said.
He emphasized that this is the territory of Ukraine, so it is the Ukrainian authorities that should govern it.
“If this is our territory — and this is our territory — then the country whose territory it is should govern it,” the president emphasized.
Zelensky also said that recent trilateral talks in the Ukraine-US-Russia format in Abu Dhabi focused on ceasefire mechanisms and how the American side would be able to monitor them. However, he said, the negotiating teams were unable to finally agree on the details without “political decisions at the highest level.”
“The Russians have one formulation, we have another, the Americans have a third. There is an understanding that there will be monitoring (of the ceasefire regime, — ed.), but there is also an understanding that more work needs to be done on the formulation and details,” the president explained.
Zelensky also noted that during this next round of negotiations, Kyiv and Washington may consider the issue of post-war planning for the Ukrainian economy. To this end, the head of the Ministry of Economy, Oleksiy Sobolev, will be added to the delegation to discuss the “prosperity package” with the United States.
On the eve of the meeting, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said that Moscow was “ready for compromises” in negotiations to end the war in Ukraine. At the same time, he noted that the goals of Russian troops “remain unchanged and are not subject to any opportunistic compromises.”