The US may be making positive noises, but exhausted Ukrainians remain wary after nearly four years of war
“I
would give anything in the world if, in this address, I could say that peace will also come in just a few minutes,” Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in a message to the Ukrainian people released just before midnight on New Year’s Eve. “Unfortunately, I cannot say that yet.”
Zelenskyy said a peace agreement was “90% ready”, but added something that subverted Donald Trump’s constant claims that a deal is just around the corner. “Those 10% contain, in fact, everything,” he said.
It is almost a year since Trump took office and promised to end Russia’s war on Ukraine within 24 hours. That never seemed possible, but as 2025 came to a close a new flurry of US diplomacy began, accompanied by more optimistic statements about peace.
