The US State Department said it would support Ukraine's negotiations with Russia only if Zelenskyy decided to do so, without external pressure. Miller emphasized that Putin has not yet shown any willingness to abandon the seizure of Ukrainian territories.
The United States will support Ukraine's negotiations with Russia only if President Volodymyr Zelenskyy decides that he wants to engage in negotiations. America or any other country should not push him to do so. This was stated at a briefing by US State Department spokesman Matthew Miller, UNN reports .
When asked, against the backdrop of President-elect Trump's statements about resolving the “conflict” in his first 24 hours in office, whether the United States would facilitate negotiations between Russia and Ukraine to end the war in Ukraine in the last two months of the administration if both sides expressed a willingness to start negotiations, Miller replied:
“If President Zelensky decides that he wants to enter into negotiations, of course, that is something that we will support. It has been our policy – our long-standing policy – that President Zelensky decides when it is time for negotiations. This is not something that we or any other country should push him to do. And we will support him in any process to try to ensure a just and lasting peace, but that is ultimately his decision, not ours.
Miller noted that the US has not seen any signs from Putin that he is ready to give up his demand to continue absorbing Ukrainian territory.
“You can just look at the statements that he keeps making – we have not seen any signs from Vladimir Putin that he is ready to give up his demand to continue absorbing Ukrainian territory. I'm sure there are negotiations that Putin will agree to if he gets everything he wants and Ukraine gets nothing that it is legally entitled to, but they are not negotiations that President Zelenskiy was interested in, and they shouldn't be,” Miller said.
AddendumAddendum
President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, commenting on the situation if Donald Trump, if he wins the US election, wants to simply force Ukraine to give up everything in order to reach an agreement with Russia, saidthat he does not think this is possible today.