Russia must withdraw to at least pre-2022 front line, Zelensky says
Russia has to pull back its troops to at least the front line as it was before the full-scale invasion in 2022, President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Feb. 15 in an interview with Newsmax.
Zelensky's comments come after earlier in the week, U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said that Ukraine was unlikely to restore its pre-2014 borders in any negotiations with Moscow on ending its war. Experts and officials in Ukraine and Europe have criticized Hegseth's comments for undermining Ukraine's leverage before peace talks with Russia have even started.
Zelensky told Newsmax that U.S. President Donald Trump could end Russia's war if Europe supports his plan.
"I think that he (Trump) needs, very much, the success, and, otherwise, everybody will say that (this) was the line of Biden and this is the line of Trump. I think he needs success, and we need success and trust him. I hope that he will be on our side," Zelensky added.
Trump has repeatedly pledged to swiftly end the war in Ukraine although he never presented a plan for achieving that.
On Feb. 12, Trump held separate calls with Russian President Vladimir Putin and Zelensky. Trump called Putin first, saying later that the two leaders agreed that negotiations to end the war in Ukraine will start "immediately."
Zelensky stressed that a peace deal "can only be about a plan to end the war," which should be agreed upon between Ukraine and the U.S. president and backed by both sides.
Zelensky said he was ready to meet with the Russian president only after a joint plan with Trump and the European Union was developed.
Russia invaded Ukraine's eastern Donbas region and annexed Crimea in 2014 following the EuroMaidan Revolution that ousted pro-Russian President Viktor Yanukovych. In 2022, Russia launched a full-scale invasion, further occupying territories in Donetsk and Luhansk regions, as well as partially occupying territories in Kharkiv, Kherson, and Zaporizhzhia oblasts.
Kateryna Hodunova
