“People familiar” told Bloomberg News on Wednesday that Ukraine is considering direct talks with Russia at a second peace summit before the U.S. presidential election in November – a report that followed rumors President Volodymyr Zelensky is worried about the health of American counterpart President Joe Biden.
Zelensky is currently in Washington, DC, meeting with Biden and other world leaders for the annual NATO military alliance summit. Ukraine is not a member of NATO but has loudly demanded entry to the alliance for years. The declaration published after private talks among NATO states included a promise that Ukraine was on an “irreversible path” to membership, as well as millions of dollars in military support. NATO has refused to integrate Ukraine, however, or offer a concrete list of demands Kyiv must fulfill before joining.
During remarks on Wednesday, Zelensky indeed confirmed that Ukraine is seeking to organize a second “peace summit” to discuss an end to the full-scale invasion of his country that Russia launched in 2022. Switzerland hosted the first “peace summit” in June, refusing to invite Russia as strongman Vladimir Putin has demanded Kyiv cede the five territories the Russian military occupies – Crimea, Kherson, Donetsk, Luhansk, and Zaporizhzhia – and give up its ambitions to join NATO.
Zelensky’s remarks about a second peace summit stated only that he sought to hold one before the end of the year, however – not necessarily before the American presidential election – and did not mention inviting Russia.
“Kyiv wants to convene a second meeting to achieve a fair peace settlement in Ukraine before the US elections in November, this time with Russia attending, according to people familiar with the matter,” Bloomberg claimed. It described one of the “people familiar” as a “Ukrainian official,” without elaborating.
The outlet described the rumors as indicating that Zelensky feels a “sense of urgency” as polling increasingly indicates that former President Donald Trump could defeat Biden in the election and significantly change Washington’s Ukraine policy. Trump and Zelensky enjoyed a famously cordial relationship; Zelensky notably defended Trump from accusations of improprieties in a phone call with himself and celebrated Trump-era sanctions on Russian projects such as the now-defunct Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline.
Bloomberg did not mention any opinion Zelensky may or may not hold about Biden. Another reported on Tuesday, however, suggested that the Ukrainian president is privately worried about Biden.
“Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is among the leaders who watched the presidential debate and is concerned about the situation, according to a Ukrainian source,” the D.C. website Axios reported. It did not offer any more details about what allegedly has Zelensky “concerned” about the situation, though Biden’s debate performance sparked a panic in the Democrat party that the elderly president may not be fit to serve another four years in the nation’s highest office because of answers to debate questions deemed unintelligible, confusing, or incoherent.
That Zelensky’s alleged anxiety surfaced in a report in Axios is significant as the Ukrainian president has used the outlet to complain even more directly about Biden in the past. In June 2021, Zelensky granted Axios an interview in which he said he was “unpleasantly surprised” by Biden’s decision to lift sanctions on the Nord Stream 2 pipeline project that would have connected Russia to Western Europe.
“It still seems to me that Nord Stream 2 … we understand that this is a weapon, a real weapon, and I speak openly about it,” Zelensky said at the time. “A weapon in the hands of the Russian Federation, and it is not very understandable, I feel, and definitely not expected, that the bullets to this weapon can possibly be provided by such a great country as the United States.”
Zelensky predicted that lifting the sanctions could embolden Russia to attack Ukraine. Putin launched a full-scale invasion of the country seven months later.
On the issue of talks with Russia, the Ukrainian government has resolutely refused any such negotiations since the early days of the full-scale invasion. Zelensky has floated the possibility of another “peace summit,” however, but not mentioned Russian participation. Speaking at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation and Institute in Washington on Wednesday, Zelensky said Ukraine was preparing to “organize the second Peace Summit this year based on the Peace Formula – even more powerful, and truly decisive. We need that support from the US.”
Zelensky did not specify if “this year” would mean a summit before or after the November election.
Shortly after the conclusion of the first summit in Switzerland, which resulted in no concrete actions from any involved party, the Ukrainian government already suggested a second such meeting could occur before the end of the year, but again did not specify that it would occur before the election.
“We have several countries [offering to host], and I can say with a high degree of probability that such a summit could take place in one of the countries of the Global South,” presidential aide Ihor Zhovkva told the Interfax news outlet in June.
Biden did not participate in the first peace summit in Switzerland, sending an envoy. Biden instead attended a fundraiser hosted by actor George Clooney, who dramatically turned on the Biden candidacy less than a month after the fundraiser.
The Russian government responded to the rumors of a potential invite to a Ukraine peace summit on Thursday, dismissing the possibility it would participate.
“We’re aware of the intentions of the Kyiv regime and its Western curators to ‘rehabilitate’ themselves for the failed ‘peace summit’… and try to hold a similar event [and] invite Russia,” Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Galuzin said in remarks to Russian news agency RIA Novosti. “We don’t accept these ultimatums and won’t participate in such ‘summits.'”
Galuzin claimed that the Ukrainian government had been “consciously disregarding other initiatives to resolve the Ukrainian crisis,” apparently a reference to Putin’s calls for Ukraine to surrender its five occupied territories in exchange for a halt in the invasion.
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