Ukraine peace talks hit by territorial dispute: negotiations without compromise
Volodymyr Zelensky has announced that no settlement has yet been reached regarding eastern Ukrainian regions claimed by Russia as part of the conditions for a ceasefire agreement.
On Friday, the Ukrainian president said that negotiators have so far failed to reach an agreement on territories in eastern Ukraine claimed by Moscow.
Speaking to journalists, including reporters from Agence France-Presse, he said: “So far, we have not been able to reach a compromise on the issue of the territorial dispute, particularly with regard to part of eastern Ukraine.”
He added that Russia had halted prisoner exchanges, accusing Moscow of being “not interested in exchanging people, because it does not believe such exchanges bring it any benefit.”
On the ground, Russia launched a missile and nearly one hundred drones overnight toward Ukrainian territory, according to the Ukrainian Air Force on Friday, a day after U.S. President Donald Trump said Moscow had agreed to halt strikes for one week.
The Ukrainian Air Force stated: “On the night of January 30, the enemy launched an Iskander-M ballistic missile (…) along with 111 drones.”
A week without fire?
On Thursday, Trump announced that his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin had agreed to suspend attacks on Kyiv and other Ukrainian cities for one week, after Russian strikes caused heating outages in buildings amid freezing temperatures.
Russian attacks on Ukraine’s energy infrastructure have disrupted electricity, heating and water supplies for millions of people during extreme cold, pushing a war-weary country closer to a humanitarian crisis.
During a Cabinet meeting at the White House, Trump said: “Because of the cold, the extreme cold… I personally asked President Putin not to bomb Kyiv, the cities and towns for one week.”
He added: “This is exceptional. It’s not just cold, it’s exceptional cold, record cold. They are facing it too; it’s a massive weather system,” comparing it to the current cold wave in Washington.
Trump continued: “They have never seen cold like this before. I personally asked President Putin not to bomb Kyiv and other cities for a week. He agreed, and I have to tell you, that was very nice.”
No immediate response came from the Kremlin, but Trump, whose summit with Putin in Alaska last August ended without a breakthrough, said he trusted the Russian president to honor the agreement.
Trump said: “People told me the call would be pointless, that it wouldn’t work. And he did it.”
He added: “We are very happy that they did.”
Later, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said he was counting on the United States to secure a one-week halt to Russian strikes.
In his daily message on social media, Zelensky stated: “We thank the United States for its efforts to stop attacks on the energy sector for the time being, and we hope it will succeed in doing so.”
