Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky announced this Sunday that the next trilateral contacts with Russia and the USA in Abu Dhabi will take place on the 4th and 5th of February and not today, the 1st of February, as originally planned.
“Ukraine is ready for a substantial discussion and we are interested in ensuring that the outcome brings us closer to a real and dignified end to the war,” he wrote on social media.
“Our negotiating team has just informed. The dates for the next trilateral meetings have been established: February 4th and 5th in Abu Dhabi”, said Zelensky and thanked “everyone who is helping”.
Until now, it was expected that, after the first contacts, the next meeting of the delegations, which will negotiate, would take place this Sunday in the capital of the Emirates, although neither party had officially confirmed this.
However, Zelensky had already hinted that there was a possibility that instability in the Middle East and tensions surrounding Iran would lead the United States to postpone the meeting.
The first meetings, a week ago, were constructive, according to those involved, and they discussed, for example, according to the Ukrainian President, the partial truce against the targets of the energy system that was announced later on Thursday by the North American leader, Donald Trump, and which both parties seem to have complied with so far.
However, One of the main obstacles that remains is the territorial issue and on Friday Zelensky insisted that Ukraine will not accept the territorial demands of Russia, which wants to keep all of Donbass to put an end to the war.
“So far we have not found a compromise on the territorial issue, specifically on the eastern part of Ukraine. We are talking about the Donetsk region”, said Zelenski, quoted by the Ukrainian public agency Ukrinform, at a press conference held in Kiev.
The Ukrainian President once again showed himself open to the possibility proposed by the US of creating a free economic zone without military presence in the area currently under Kiev’s control, demanded by Moscow, but made it clear that this must happen without this territory ceasing to be Ukrainian.
Since last weekend, diplomatic contacts have continued, and the White House emissary for the conflict, Steve Witkoff, met this Saturday in Florida with Russian special envoy Kiril Dmitriev, in a meeting that was considered “productive”.
Leave a Reply