Kyiv’s Foreign ‍Minister has said the Ukrainian and Russian leaders need to meet in person to hash out the hardest remaining issues in peace talks, and that only U.S. ​President Donald Trump has the power to bring about an agreement.

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Ukraine wants to accelerate the efforts to ‌end the four-year-old war and capitalise on momentum in the U.S.-brokered talks before other factors come into play, such as campaigning ​for the U.S. Congressional mid-term elections in November, Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha said in an interview.

Ukraine says final deal with Russia needs Trump

“Only Trump can stop the war,” Mr. Sybiha told Reuters in his office in Kyiv, close to the Dnipro river.

From a 20-point peace plan that has formed the basis of recent trilateral negotiations, only “a few” items remain outstanding, Sybiha said. “The most sensitive and most difficult, to be dealt with at the leaders’ level.”

On key issues, such as land, the two sides appear far apart. Russia has maintained its demand that Ukraine cede the remaining 20% of the eastern region of Donetsk that it has failed to occupy during years ​of grinding, attritional warfare — something that Kyiv has steadfastly refused. Ukraine also wants control over the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant — the ⁠largest in Europe — which is in Russian-occupied territory.

During a second round of trilateral peace talks in Abu Dhabi this week there was no sign of a breakthrough, though an exchange of 314 prisoners of war was concluded on Thursday (February 5, 2026) – the first such swap since October. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy told reporters on Saturday that the U.S. ​had proposed a new round of talks in Miami in ⁠a week, which Kyiv had agreed to.

“My assessment is we have momentum, that’s true,” Sybiha, in post since 2024, said in an interview conducted on Friday (February 6). “We need consolidation or mobilisation of these peace efforts, and we’re ready to speed up.”

Nearly four years after its full-scale invasion in February 2022, Russia occupies almost a fifth of Ukraine’s territory — including the Crimean Peninsula and parts of eastern Ukraine occupied ‌before the war — and has devastated the electricity and heating network with targeted bombing. On the battlefield, analysts say Russia ‌has gained only about 1.3% of Ukrainian territory since early 2023. Mr. Zelenskyy said on Saturday (February 7) that Washington hoped the war could be ended before the summer and Ukraine had suggested a sequencing plan, but he provided no details.

Sources ‍had told Reuters on Friday (February 6) that Ukrainian and U.S. officials had discussed a timetable including a draft deal with Russia by March and a referendum on it in Ukraine alongside elections in May.

U.S. Security guarantess were vital, Ukraine says

Ukraine is focused on obtaining Western security guarantees to deter ‍future Russian aggression once a ceasefire enters force.

The U.S., Sybiha said, had confirmed to Ukraine that it was prepared to ratify security guarantees in Congress; it would then provide a security “backstop” to support the peace deal, though no U.S. troops on the ground in Ukraine.

“I personally do not believe, at this stage, in any security infrastructure or architecture without the Americans … We must have them with us – and they are in the process. That’s a huge, huge achievement,” he said.

A statement issued after a meeting in Paris last month of the “coalition of the willing” said the allies would participate in a proposed U.S.-led ceasefire monitoring and verification mechanism. Officials have said this would likely involve drones, sensors and satellites, not U.S. troops.

The foreign minister said some other countries beyond Britain and France, both already publicly committed, had confirmed their readiness to send troops to Ukraine ⁠as a deterrence force, but he declined to identify them.

Apart from “boots on the ground”, Sybiha said there should be a mechanism akin to the NATO alliance’s Article Five that classifies an attack on one member state as an ​attack on all. Ukraine’s proposed membership of the European Union would also provide an additional element of security, he said. Zelenskiy has said Ukraine wants ⁠to join the 27-nation bloc by 2027 – which would require significant reforms and legislation.

On Saturday, Zelenskiy raised concerns about bilateral talks between Russia and the U.S., which he said included a proposal from Moscow for $12 trillion in investments.

Sybiha said some of these discussions could affect Ukraine’s sovereignty or security, and Kyiv would not support any such deals made without it.

He also said any country’s decision in the course of a peace settlement to recognise Russian sovereignty over Crimea or the Donbas, Ukraine’s eastern industrial ⁠heartland, would be “legally void”.

“We will never recognise this. And it will be a violation of international law,” Sybiha said. “This was not about Ukraine. It’s about principle.”

Published – February 08, 2026 06:32 pm IST

U.S. President Donald Trump said Sunday (December 28, 2025) he believes both Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Russian President Vladimir Putin truly want peace, as he welcomed the “brave” Ukrainian leader for talks at his Florida resort.

“The two leaders want it to end,” Mr. Trump said at the outset of the meeting at Mar-a-Lago. Before Mr. Zelenskyy arrived, Mr. Trump spoke with Mr. Putin by phone for more than an hour, and planned to speak with him again soon after.

Greeting Mr. Zelenskyy at Mar-a-Lago, Mr. Trump said of him: “This gentleman has worked very hard, and is very brave, and his people are very brave.” Mr. Zelenskyy, by Mr. Trump’s side, said he’d discuss issues of territorial concessions with Mr. Trump, which have so far been a red line for his country. He said his negotiators and Mr. Trump’s “have discussed how to move step by step and bring peace closer” and would continue to do so in the meeting.

Russia intensified its attacks on Ukraine’s capital in the days before the meeting.

Mr. Putin’s foreign affairs adviser Yuri Ushakov, said the call was initiated by the U.S. side, lasted over an hour, and was “friendly, benevolent, and businesslike.” Ushakov said Trump and Putin agreed to speak again “promptly” after Mr. Trump’s meeting with Mr. Zelenskyy.

Mr. Trump and Mr. Zelenskyy met at Mr. Trump’s private club in Palm Beach, where the U.S. President is spending the holidays. Mr. Zelenskyy, who arrived in Miami in the morning, said the two planned to discuss security and economic agreements in their early afternoon meeting. He said he will raise “territorial issues” as Moscow and Kyiv remain fiercely at odds over the fate of the Donbas region in eastern Ukraine.

In overnight developments, three guided aerial bombs launched by Russia struck private homes in the eastern city of Sloviansk, according to the head of the local military administration, Vadym Lakh. Three people were injured and one man died, Lakh said in a post on the Telegram messenger app.

The strike came the day after Russia attacked Ukraine’s capital with ballistic missiles and drones on Saturday, killing at least one person and wounding 27, a day before planned talks between the leaders of Ukraine and the United States, Ukrainian authorities said. Explosions boomed across Kyiv as the attack began in the early morning and continued for hours.

In advance of his meeting with Mr. Trump, Mr. Zelenskyy said Sunday that he spoke on the phone with British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, filling him in “on the situation on the frontline and on the consequences of Russian strikes.” He posted on X: “Thank you, Keir, for the constant coordination!” Mr. Zelenskyy’s office said he will speak by phone with allies after the meeting with Trump.

Mr. Trump, on Truth Social, said he and Mr. Zelenskyy will meet in the main dining room of Mar-a-Lago and the news media will be allowed in.

In a meeting Saturday with Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Zelenskyy said the key to peace is “pressure on Russia and sufficient, strong support for Ukraine.” To that end, Mr. Carney announced more economic assistance from his government to help Ukraine rebuild.

Denouncing the “barbarism” of Russia’s latest attacks on Kyiv, Carney credited both Zelenskyy and Trump with creating the conditions for a “just and lasting peace” at a crucial moment.

“Ukraine is willing to do whatever it takes to stop this war,” Mr. Zelenskyy posted Saturday. “We need to be strong at the negotiating table.” In response to the attacks, he wrote: “We want peace, and Russia demonstrates a desire to continue the war. If the whole world — Europe and America — is on our side, together we will stop” Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Mr. Trump and Mr. Zelenskyy sitting down face-to-face also underscored the apparent progress made by Mr. Trump’s top negotiators in recent weeks as the sides traded draft peace plans and continued to shape a proposal to end the fighting. Zelenskyy told reporters Friday that the 20-point draft proposal negotiators have discussed is “about 90 per cent ready” — echoing a figure, and the optimism, that US officials conveyed when Mr. Trump’s chief negotiators met with Mr. Zelenskyy in Berlin earlier this month.

During the recent talks, the U.S. agreed to offer certain security guarantees to Ukraine similar to those offered to other members of NATO. The proposal came as Zelenskyy said he was prepared to drop his country’s bid to join the security alliance if Ukraine received NATO-like protection that would be designed to safeguard it against future Russian attacks.

Intensive’ weeks ahead

Mr. Zelenskyy also spoke on Christmas Day with US special envoy Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law. The Ukrainian leader said they discussed “certain substantive details” and cautioned “there is still work to be done on sensitive issues” and “the weeks ahead may also be intensive.” The US president has been working to end the war in Ukraine for much of his first year back in office, showing irritation with both Zelenskyy and Putin while publicly acknowledging the difficulty of ending the conflict. Long gone are the days when, as a candidate in 2024, he boasted that he could resolve the fighting in a day.

After hosting Mr. Zelenskyy at the White House in October, Mr. Trump demanded that both Russia and Ukraine halt fighting and “stop at the battle line,” implying that Moscow should be able to keep the territory it has seized from Ukraine.

Mr. Zelenskyy said last week that he would be willing to withdraw troops from Ukraine’s eastern industrial heartland as part of a plan to end the war, if Russia also pulls back and the area becomes a demilitarized zone monitored by international forces.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters Friday that the Kremlin had already been in contact with US.

“It was agreed upon to continue the dialogue,” he said.

Putin wants Russian gains kept, and more

Mr. Putin has publicly said he wants all the areas in four key regions that have been captured by his forces, as well as the Crimean Peninsula, illegally annexed in 2014, to be recognised as Russian territory. He also has insisted that Ukraine withdraw from some areas in eastern Ukraine that Moscow’s forces haven’t captured. Kyiv has publicly rejected all those demands.

The Kremlin also wants Ukraine to abandon its bid to join NATO. It warned that it wouldn’t accept the deployment of any troops from members of the military alliance and would view them as a “legitimate target.” Mr. Putin also has said Ukraine must limit the size of its army and give official status to the Russian language, demands he has made from the outset of the conflict.

Mr. Putin’s foreign affairs adviser, Yuri Ushakov, told the business daily Kommersant this month that Russian police and national guard would stay in parts of Donetsk -– one of the two major areas, along with Luhansk, that make up the Donbas region — even if they become a demilitarized zone under a prospective peace plan.

Mr. Ushakov cautioned that trying to reach a compromise could take a long time. He said US proposals that took into account Russian demands had been “worsened” by alterations proposed by Ukraine and its European allies.

Mr. Trump has been somewhat receptive toMr. Putin’s demands, making the case that the Russian president can be persuaded to end the war if Kyiv agrees to cede Ukrainian land in the Donbas region and if Western powers offer economic incentives to bring Russia back into the global economy.

Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. File
| Photo Credit: AP

Alexandre Fasel, Swiss Foreign Secretary.
| Photo Credit: Special arrangement

India has not “determined its attendance” at next month’s Ukraine Peace Conference in Switzerland, repeated the Ministry of External Affairs, as Swiss Foreign Secretary Alexandre Fasel met with his counterparts in Delhi for another attempt to secure India’s participation.

Speaking to The Hindu, Mr. Fasel said that it was important for Switzerland that India and other emerging economy partners of the BRICS grouping (Brazil-Russia-India-China-South Africa), minus Russia which hasn’t been invited, attend the summit, help by conveying messages to Moscow, and play a bigger role at a future peace summit when both Russia and Ukraine are at the table. In the past, External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar has disclosed that the government has played a role in bearing messages to the Kremlin on the Black Sea Grain initiative and about concerns over nuclear threats. 

“India and the fellow BICS [BRICS minus Russia] countries are in the situation where they have good contacts with Russia and also with Western countries. They can act as go-betweens that have the trust of either side,” Mr. Fasel, State Secretary of the Swiss Foreign Ministry said when asked what his expectations from the Indian government was, after his meeting with Secretary (West) Pavan Kapoor. 

“They [BICS] will have a determining role when the situation becomes right [to bring Russia and Ukraine to the table together],” he added, pointing out that the Swiss conference, slated in the resort town of Burgenstock on June 15-16, would not work on a peace proposal per se, but build a framework or road map to start peace talks. 

The Swiss Foreign Secretary visited Delhi, even as Russian President Vladimir Putin slammed the conference organisers for not inviting Russia, and said that they only intended to “put pressure on Russia” with an outcome statement.

When asked whether the absence of Russia, a party to the conflict, would make the conference one-sided, Mr. Fasel said that at present the Swiss approach was an “unorthodox one”, as both sides could not be at the table together, but did not rule out an invitation to Russia for the next summit. In addition he said that three issues that could be discussed without the two parties were freedom of navigation and food security, nuclear safety, and humanitarian issues, all of which India has expressed concern about.

Since February, when the Swiss government first invited India to the conference, New Delhi has made it clear that it will only clarify its participation once the election process is over in the first week of June. On Friday, Ministry spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal repeated the stand, saying, “We have received the invitation from the Swiss side, and we are yet to decide on our participation.”

Even so, Mr. Fasel said he remained hopeful that New Delhi would respond positively.

“I am hopeful because there is this expectation from the international community on one side, and from [Switzerland] bilaterally, that we need India to be there and to contribute.” He also said it was important to have a high representation from the “Global South” or developing world as they would be most influential in shaping global governance in the future. He also pointed that since National Security Advisor (NSA) Ajit Doval had attended NSA-track meetings on Ukraine in different formats already, India would also be part of the enhance-level meeting of Heads of State/Heads of Government.

According to the Swiss Foreign Ministry, 50 countries of the 160 invited have so far confirmed their participation, indicating that the majority of countries who have accepted including the G-7 leadership are from the West or are western allies like Japan and Australia, who are already part of the sanctions regime against Russia. Mr. Fasel insisted that Switzerland remains a “neutral” venue, despite the fact that it has also imposed sanctions on Russia, saying that being neutral did not mean being “indifferent” to the continuing war, or “doing nothing” to stop it.   

He also confirmed that none of the BICS countries had responded to the invitations sent out. 

India, which will await a new government to be formed by mid-June, will be able to decide its participation as well as the level of its delegation after other countries confirm their participation. In particular, New Delhi will watch the Chinese decision, given that China has begun a peace process of its own, offering a 12-point peace formula, and sending leaders including Foreign Minister Wang Yi for visits to Ukraine, various countries in Europe and Turkey to discuss a resolution to the war.