Zelenskyy says redrafted peace plan ‘looks better’ but Kaja Kallas fears Moscow meeting will wrongfully put pressure on Kyiv rather than Kremlin. What we know on day 1,378
An intensified diplomatic push to end the nearly four-year war has continued, with Volodymyr Zelenskyy visiting Paris on Monday – a day after the Ukrainian president’s team held talks with US officials – and Vladimir Putin due to meet with US special envoy Steve Witkoff on Tuesday.
Zelenskyy, speaking in Paris, said the Kremlin’s claims of battlefield advances were exaggerated. He said Ukraine’s priorities remained security guarantees, sovereignty and territorial integrity, as he insisted that Russia must not get rewards for its aggression on Ukraine. He said he hoped to have talks with the US president, Donald Trump, to discuss next steps once Steve Witkoff is back from his talks in Russia.
Ukraine’s president said that after revisions the peace plan circulating between Ukraine, Russia and Washigton “looks better” and the work will continue. The EU’s foreign policy chief, Kaja Kallas, warned however that talks between the Putin and Witkoff will again pile pressure on Ukraine to make concessions, write Jennifer Rankin and Pjotr Sauer. Kallas said: “In order to have peace, we shouldn’t lose focus that it’s actually Russia who has started this war and Russia that is continuing this war and Russia that is really targeting civilians, civilian infrastructure every single day to cause as much damage as possible.”
