By Andrew MacAskill, Tom Balmforth and Max Hunder, Reuters
Volodymyr Zelensky. Photo: JULIEN DE ROSA / AFP
- Zelensky flies to Washington on Monday to meet Trump
- Merz, Macron, Starmer, Meloni, von der Leyen to accompany him
- Rubio sees progress but says both sides need to make concessions
- Putin wants swathe of Ukraine land in peace deal, sources say
- Putin warned Europe against 'behind-the-scenes intrigue'
European leaders will join Volodymyr Zelensky to meet Donald Trump in Washington, they said on Sunday, seeking to shore up Zelensky's position as the US president presses Ukraine to accept a quick peace deal to end Europe's deadliest war in 80 years.
Trump is leaning on Zelensky to strike an agreement after he met Kremlin chief Vladimir Putin in Alaska and emerged more aligned with Moscow on seeking a peace deal instead of a ceasefire first. Trump and Zelensky will meet on Monday.
"If peace is not going to be possible here and this is just going to continue on as a war, people will continue to die by the thousands... we may unfortunately wind up there, but we don't want to wind up there," Secretary of State Marco Rubio said in an interview with CBS' Face the Nation.
Trump on Sunday promised "BIG PROGRESS ON RUSSIA" in a social media post without specifying what this might be. Sources briefed on Moscow's thinking told Reuters the US and Russian leaders have discussed proposals for Russia to relinquish tiny pockets of occupied Ukraine in exchange for Kyiv ceding a swathe of fortified land in the east and freezing the front lines elsewhere.
Top Trump officials hinted that the fate of Ukraine's eastern Donbas region - which incorporates Donetsk and Luhansk and which is already mostly under Russian control - was on the line, while some sort of defensive pact was also on the table.
"We were able to win the following concession, that the United States could offer Article 5-like protection," Trump envoy Steve Witkoff told CNN's State of the Union on Sunday, suggesting this would be in lieu of Ukraine seeking NATO membership.
"The United States could offer Article 5 protection, which was the first time we had ever heard the Russians agree to that."
Article 5 of NATO's founding treaty enshrines the principle of collective defense - the notion that an attack on a single member is considered an attack on them all. That pledge may not be enough to sway leaders in Kyiv to sign over Donbas. Ukraine's borders were already meant to have been guaranteed when Ukraine surrendered a Soviet-era nuclear arsenal in 1994, and it proved to be little deterrent when Russia absorbed Crimea in 2014 and then launched its full-scale invasion in 2022. The war has now dragged on for three-and-a-half-years and killed or wounded more than 1 million people.
German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, French President Emmanuel Macron, and British Prime Minister Keir Starmer hosted a meeting of allies on Sunday to bolster Zelensky's hand, hoping in particular to lock down robust security guarantees for Ukraine that would include a US role.
The Europeans are keen to help Zelensky avoid a repeat of his last Oval Office meeting in February. That went disastrously, with Trump and Vice President JD Vance giving the Ukrainian leader a public dressing-down, accusing him of being ungrateful and disrespectful.
Vice President JD Vance speaks during a meeting with President Donald Trump, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and Secretary of State Marco Rubio in the Oval Office on February 28, 2025. Photo: Andrew Harnik/Getty Images via CNN Newsource
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen will also travel to Washington, as will Finland's President Alexander Stubb, whose access to Trump included rounds of golf in Florida earlier this year, and Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, who is an admirer of many of Trump's policies.
"It's important that Washington is with us," Zelensky said alongside von der Leyen on a visit to Brussels, saying that the current front lines in the war should be the basis for peace talks.
"Putin does not want to stop the killing, but he must do it."
'Steel porcupine'
Setting out red lines, von der Leyen said Ukraine's allies wanted robust security guarantees for Ukraine, no limits to Ukraine's armed forces, and a seat at the table with Trump and Putin for Ukraine to discuss its territory.
"As I've often said, Ukraine must become a steel porcupine, indigestible for potential invaders," she said.
Rubio said both Russia and Ukraine would need to make concessions to reach a peace deal and that security guarantees for Ukraine would be discussed on Monday. He also said there would have to be additional consequences for Russia if no deal was reached.
Marco Rubio. Photo: Pool / AFP / Jacquelyn Martin
"I'm not saying we're on the verge of a peace deal, but I am saying that we saw movement, enough movement to justify a follow-up meeting with Zelensky and the Europeans, enough movement for us to dedicate even more time to this," Rubio told broadcaster CBS.
However, he said the US may not be able to create a scenario to end the war.
"If peace is not going to be possible here and this is just going to continue on as a war, people will continue to die by the thousands... we may unfortunately wind up there, but we don't want to wind up there," Rubio said in an interview with Face the Nation.
'Very big power'
For his part, Putin briefed his close ally, Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko, about the Alaska talks, and also spoke with Kazakhstan's President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev.
Trump said on Friday that Ukraine should make a deal to end the war because "Russia is a very big power, and they're not."
After the Alaska summit, Trump phoned Zelensky and told him that the Kremlin chief had offered to freeze most front lines if Ukraine ceded all of Donetsk, the industrial region that is one of Moscow's main targets, a source familiar with the matter said. Zelensky rejected the demand. Russia already controls a fifth of Ukraine, including about three-quarters of Donetsk province, which it first entered in 2014.
Trump also said he agreed with Putin that a peace deal should be sought without the prior ceasefire that Ukraine and its European allies have called for. That was a reversal of his position before the summit, when he said he would not be happy unless a ceasefire was agreed on.
- Reuters
