Russia would accept Ukraine’s accession to the European Union as part of a U.S.-brokered agreement to end the bloody and protracted war Vladimir Putin started nearly four years ago, U.S. officials said Monday following talks with Ukrainian representatives in Berlin.
The surprising revelation came as officials were briefing reporters after several days of negotiations between U.S. Special Presidential Envoy Steve Witkoff, President Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner, and a delegation from Kyiv that included Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and his National Security and Defense Council head, Rustem Umerov.
One of the U.S. officials involved in the talks, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told reporters that the proposed 20-point agreement would include “a very, very strong security package” that would provide Ukraine with “Article 5-like security guarantees” from the U.S. and other allies, akin to those enjoyed by NATO members, without Kyiv becoming a part of the 32-member defensive alliance.
The official called the security guarantees “the biggest win” in the talks for Ukraine and Europe, and said Moscow would accept those and other provisions that would provide for “a strong and free Ukraine” following implementation of the proposed agreement.
He also said Russia is “open to Ukraine joining the E.U.” and suggested that the development would be the largest expansion of the 27-member common market since the fall of the Berlin Wall.
A second U.S. official said the “right framework” in an agreement to end the Russia-Ukraine war could create a “new path forward” under which “Europe and Russia can finally have an arrangement and understanding that can lead to a more peaceful and prosperous future for everyone.”
News of Moscow’s potential willingness to accept Ukraine joining the E.U. as part of a deal, with strong security guarantees from the U.S. and others, comes less than a day after Zelensky offered to drop Kyiv’s longstanding desire for NATO membership at the outset of the talks between himself, Witkoff and Kushner.
In a WhatsApp chat with reporters, Zelensky noted that “some partners from the U.S. and Europe did not support this direction” of NATO membership for his country.
“Thus, today, bilateral security guarantees between Ukraine and the U.S., Article 5-like guarantees for us from the U.S., and security guarantees from European colleagues, as well as other countries — Canada, Japan — are an opportunity to prevent another Russian invasion,” he added.
For the U.S. to guarantee a NATO-like response to an attack on Ukraine, any agreement would have to be submitted to the U.S. Senate for ratification as a treaty, but one of the U.S. officials said Trump was willing to do this in order to give Kyiv “the platinum standard for what can be offered.”
“He [Trump] sees this as a strategic priority that he’s willing to do to end the war, because he thinks there’s a lot of good things that can happen for the U.S. if this is done,” he said.
If Moscow accepted a decision by Ukraine to join the E.U., it would represent a massive shift on an issue that helped spark the current conflagration between the two countries.
After the former president of Ukraine, Viktor Yanukovych, rejected an agreement that would have led to greater ties between Ukraine and the E.U. in November 2013, subsequent protests and outrage over a bloody crackdown ordered by Yanukovych led to his ouster and replacement by a more pro-Western government in February 2014.
That same month, Russia invaded and illegally annexed Ukraine’s Crimean peninsula while also supporting separatist movements in the Eastern parts of the country that remain the focus of fighting nearly four years after the February 2022 invasion.
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