Name: Can Ukraine avoid making concessions to end the war? | DW News
Uploaded: 2025-12-05T16:50:19.000Z
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Ukrainian and US Negotiators meet in Florida today to discuss a plan to end the war with Russia.

This follows up to Tuesday's meeting in Moscow between Vladimir Putin, US Envoy Steve Witkoff, and

President Trump's son in law, Jared Kushner.

Although no real progress was made, the Kremlin described the meeting as useful and constructive.

So what's likely to happen today in Florida?

She's a senior visiting research fellow at the Russia Institute and specializes in conflict and peace studies.

So this is the US Team meeting, the Ukrainians.

What, what's likely to happen at this meeting?

I think we are not going to see something very substantial because certainly the American team has an obligation to brief the Ukrainian team on how they, how they perceive the outcome of the meeting in Moscow.

And certainly five hours they have gone through every point.

And that discussion probably gave the American team a very clear view where there is some flexibility on the Russian side and where they have like absolute.

Okay, so that is probably going to be more of information meeting rather than a negotiation meeting.

President Putin, of course, is in India at the moment.

Just before he landed, he gave a TV interview and he qualified his meeting with the US Delegation this week.

He said it was constructive, necessary and difficult work.

What did you, I gather you watch the interview.

What did you take away from the Russian president's remarks?

Russian president generally felt quite relaxed, quite together.

Quite often he seemed like he was enjoying himself.

He obviously clear had a command of the field he was talking about, because he was asked all sorts of questions, some from different fields.

But the only point when he became a bit more sort of sober and perhaps a bit more sort of grave when he talked about NATO enlargement, broken promise, things which were promised to Russia in 1990s.

And then there were ways of native expansion.

So that was perhaps the only change in otherwise quite jolly, quite amicable talk, full of humor remarks, improvisation.

And obviously Putin feeling very confident and not isolated.

So while Putin is in India, the French president is in China.

During his visit, Emmanuel Macron called on President Xi to try and use his influence to end this war.

And throughout this war, the same question keeps coming up.

Does anybody care what European leaders have to say about this conflict?

Perhaps it was more of a factor at the beginning because also at that time, European leaders worked very much together with the Biden administration.

Now we are looking at the situation where China doesn't Need Europe that much.

It needs, of course, European market, but they can go reduce their dependency on that.

But we in Europe, we do really need China to produce manufactured goods.

So the equation, the power equation is more in the Chinese favor.

President Macron is very determined to play a very notable and very sometimes quite colorful role in the international diplomacy so that he's bound to press this point to presidency.

I'm not sure that Beijing would take very great notice out of it.

Thank you for talking us through that, Anna.

Anna Matveva, Senior Visiting Research Fellow at the Russia Institute.

Ivana Stradna is a research fellow at the foundation for Defence of Democracy's Russia Program.

I asked her what she was most looking out for in these talks in Florida.

I'm actually watching mostly what happened just in Moscow, and that Putin actually rejected the deal.

And that really doesn't come as a surprise to anyone because we have to zoom out and to understand why Putin did that.

Putin wants to actually put a ball in Zelenskyy's court and to ask maximalist demands.

So Ukraine actually rejects, and then Washington portrays Ukraine as an unreliable partner.

The ultimate goal of Putin right now is to make sure that also the United States gives up, you know, given that President Trump has been hoping for a quick deal and then to put actually everything in Europe's court.

So we have to understand that that's the ultimate goal.

I truly hope within the coming days that the United States is not going to push further.

Ukraine asking for some territorial concessions because what we saw, how Putin again threaten, you know, Donbas, how Putin continues with drone attacks on Ukraine, that tells us actually everything that we need to know, that actually the United States has not been trying, you know, to push Ukraine towards that direction.

But that's not something that Putin wants.

And my final point to this is also that Putin has been trying to divide Europe on this issue and to make sure that our center of gravity, which is alliance, that doesn't work.

And that's extremely important right now to watch.

That's something that I'm watching among allies that we are speaking in one voice.

Okay, I just want to go back, I think, to the first part of your answer.

Vladimir Putin has accused Europe of sabotaging these U.

But he's called his own meeting with the US Delegation this week constructive and necessary.

So are you saying that this use of very different language is somehow trying to sow dissent between Europe and the US So that if the talks possibly falter, then Vladimir Putin can Pin the blame on Europe for there not being progress.

You're absolutely right in sense to note that Putin has been blaming Europe for some unrealistic demands, as he loves usually, you know, to talk and basically portraying Europe as a warmonger.

I'm actually, even if he said, you know, that talks were decent with the United States, actions speak louder than words because just over the past 24 hours, Putin has actually increased attacks on Ukraine.

And that tells us all we need to know that actually he was not very also happy to see the proposal to go back to Europe.

Putin, first of all, Europe understands very well, especially Germany, France and the United Kingdom, that they have to take the lead in this effort because Putin is already at war with Europe, not only with Ukraine.

And I understand that for a lot of Western analysts this may sound a crazy thing, but

actually, you know, just think about a new generation of warfare, as the Russian military calls it.

Putin has already tried, you know, sabotage activity, activities across Europe, including in Germany, cutting sea cables in the Baltic states, drone incursions.

So Europe understands very well that this war is not going to stop at Ukraine and that NATO's Article 5 is at risk.

Once again, I understand that some Western analysts might think this is ridiculous to even think that Putin cannot take Ukraine, but

Yes, because Putin understands that he has time and will and he is going to actually challenge Article 5 and to make sure that Europe does not respond.

And that's precisely why right now Germany, France and United Kingdom understand perfectly why they need to stop Putin now.

But are you saying also that even if a deal was reached, that Putin can't be trusted really to finally end this?

We cannot trust Putin because Russia has had like a long history of violating agreements.

We already know what, what happened 30 years ago, what happened in 2014.

So whoever believes that Putin is willing to negotiate in good faith lives in a parallel universe.

That's also not part of the Kremlin strategic effort, basically, which is based, you know, on deception.

And that's precisely, you know, why we cannot trust Putin with his words.

And that's precisely the only language that Putin understands.

And my last point to that, if I may add, Europe and also the United States should not fear escalations because Europe and the United States are much stronger than Russia and Russian economy in 2026.

There are multi multiple projections that is not going to be able to sustain.

And having said that Putin is just buying more time, so have to give up on our Western analysis of the Kremlin.

And we have to understand how Putin thinks in terms of his mindset when it comes to deception.

And we are the ones who know that we should not allow this to happen because the only thing that he has is time right now and the will.

We've been speaking to Ivana Stradna, research fellow at the foundation for Defence of Democracy's Russia Program.