Ukraine’s foreign minister proposes peace summit for February

WASHINGTON - Ukraine’s foreign minister said on Monday that his government hopes to have a peace summit by the end of February, about one year after

Russia invaded Ukraine.

In an interview with the Associated Press, Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said the United Nations could host the summit, with Secretary-General Antonio Guterres acting as the possible mediator.

“Every war ends in a diplomatic way,” Mr Kuleba said. “Every war ends as a result of the actions taken on the battlefield and at the negotiating table.”

Mr Kuleba said Russia would need to face prosecution for war crimes at an international court to attend the summit.

Mr Kuleba added that he was “absolutely satisfied” with

President Volodymyr Zelensky’s visit to the United States last week

and that the Patriot missile battery would be operational in Ukraine within six months.

Although Ukrainian officials have proposed a peace deal for months, and Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Monday that he was willing to negotiate, US and European officials have said it is difficult to envision terms of a settlement that both Ukraine and Russia would accept.

This month, Mr Zelensky discussed his vision for a global peace summit in a call with President Joe Biden. And in November, at the annual Group of 20 summit in Bali, Mr Zelensky spoke about his “path to peace” to end the war, noting that Ukraine would not compromise on its stance until its territory was reinstated.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Moscow’s proposals for settlement in Ukraine are well known to Kyiv and either Ukraine fulfils them for their own good or the Russian army will decide the issue.

“Our proposals for the demilitarisation and denazification of the territories controlled by the regime, the elimination of threats to Russia’s security emanating from there, including our new lands, are well known to the enemy,” the TASS agency quoted Mr Lavrov as saying late on Monday. 

Moscow has been calling its invasion in Ukraine a “special military operation” to “demilitarise” and “denazify” its neighbour. Kyiv and its Western allies call it an imperial-style aggression to grab land. 

In September, Moscow proclaimed it had annexed four provinces of Ukraine – Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson – after holding so-called referendums that were rejected as bogus and illegal by Kyiv and its allies. 

There is no end in sight to the war, which has entered its 11th month and which has killed thousands, displaced millions and turned cities into rubble. 

Kyiv has ruled out conceding any land to Russia in return for peace, and publicly demands Russia relinquish all territory. Moscow has insisted it is pursing “demilitarisation” and “denazification” but in reality its aims have not been fully defined. NYTIMES, REUTERS