Zelensky says he does not want to be the leader who handed Ukraine land to Putin

MUNICH – Mr Volodymyr Zelensky said he does not want to be remembered as the President who handed Ukrainian land to Russia. 

Speaking on a panel moderated by Bloomberg Television’s Francine Lacqua on Feb 14, he said he is prepared to engage with US President Donald Trump’s initiative to end the war in Ukraine, but he wants to agree on an approach with allies before confronting Mr Vladimir Putin.

“I don’t want to be the person in history who helped Putin to occupy my country,” Mr Zelensky told the audience at the Munich Security Conference. 

Mr Zelensky is coming under desperate pressure from the Trump White House this week after senior US officials said it is not realistic to aspire to regaining parts of Ukraine captured by the Kremlin. Mr Trump has also suggested Mr Zelensky needs to call an election in order to renew his mandate, an idea that echoes talking points from the Kremlin. 

As Europe scrambles to formulate a response to the dramatic shifts in US policy this week, some officials said they should aim to agree on security guarantees for Ukraine – and the role of the US – before they start negotiating with Mr Putin.

With Mr Trump talking about meeting soon with Mr Putin in Saudi Arabia and European leaders struggling to get face time with the US leader, EU officials, like Mr Zelensky, are at risk of being squeezed out of the discussions over Ukraine’s future. 

European officials and Kyiv have both said that peace talks cannot happen without Ukraine and Europe. Mr Trump has said negotiations would start immediately. 

“Because we are giving guarantees against Putin, it is nonsense that we can negotiate this with him,” Estonian Foreign Minister Margus Tsahkna told Bloomberg in an interview at the conference on Feb 14.

Leaders converged on the Bavarian capital in search of details on how the US will shepherd negotiations, and Mr Trump said he wants to bring the war to a quick end.

But Mr Zelensky had backing from Republican senators who sought to downplay any notion that the US would abandon Ukraine or strike a deal that undermines the country’s sovereignty. 

“This will not end poorly,” US Senator Lindsey Graham told Mr Zelensky on the stage in Munich. He argued that Kyiv’s struggle to secure Nato accession was not just down to Mr Trump, since other members of the alliance have been reluctant too. But he also gave a ringing endorsement of the role for Mr Zelensky and Ukraine in Europe’s future security. 

“How do you deter Putin?” he said, grabbing the Ukrainian leader by the shoulder, “You arm this guy to the teeth.”

Several officials said the start of real negotiations is still some way away despite Mr Trump’s words. There is a lot of planning before talks can begin, one of the officials said. Another official dismissed the possibility of formal talks moving ahead without Europe even if Mr Trump and Mr Putin were to meet.

The Estonian Foreign Minister and other officials were also sceptical that Mr Putin was serious about negotiations or that his overall aims, including reshaping Europe’s security balance, had changed.

‘Everyone is afraid’

But Europeans are struggling to keep up with the Trump team’s fast-paced pronouncements.

US Vice-President J.D. Vance has told The Wall Street Journal that sending US troops to Ukraine if Moscow fails to negotiate in good faith remained “on the table”. But his speech in Munich dealt little with European security and instead aligned with the European right in scolding establishment parties for what he said were attacks on the region’s democratic standards. 

At the same time, US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth was in Warsaw suggesting that the US position on occupied territory in Ukraine is still not fixed. 

In Munich, Mr Zelensky’s team presented their proposals to a revised draft of a plan that would give the US access to Ukrainian minerals in exchange for security, according to an official familiar with the talks. US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent visited Kyiv this week to present an economic partnership agreement necessary for continued American support.

While Mr Trump bills himself as a master negotiator, many of Ukraine’s staunchest allies have openly fretted that Mr Putin is racking up a string of wins before talks have even begun. Europeans lamented that Mr Trump called Mr Putin for a chat lasting more than an hour without giving them advance warning, and some expressed concerns that the US was effectively dialling back its commitment to the continent. 

“Everyone is afraid they may be left without US support,” Mr Zelensky had said earlier. “It’s not good.” BLOOMBERG