US defense minister Pete Hegseth says that a return to the borders of Ukraine before 2014 is unrealistic and the Trump government does not see NATO membership for Kyiv as part of a solution to the war caused by Russia’s invasion.
Hegseth said at a meeting in which the NATO members in Brussels were involved that the White House does not see NATO membership for Ukraine as a “realistic result of a negotiation settlement” to end the war.
Hegseth said that the United States is still “full stop” for NATO and a defense partnership with Europe. However, the security guarantees of Ukraine should be supported by “capable European and non-European troops”, said the Pentagon boss.
“If these troops are used as peace forces for Ukraine at any point in time, they should be used as part of a non-Nato mission and should not be treated under Article 5,” he said, referring to the mutual defense of the Alliance.
Shortly afterwards, US President Donald Trump said on Wednesday on social media that he had a lengthy and highly productive call with Russian President Vladimir Putin about a wide range of topics, including the Middle East and the Middle East and the Artificial Intelligence. Trump had been careful with reporters in his first month whether he had had talks with Putin.
The Russian news agencies confirmed the conversation and said Putin had expanded Trump an invitation to come to Moscow after talks.
Trump said he had led members of his cabinet and other civil servants to lead negotiations to apply for an end to war.
It is not believed that Trump has spoken to the Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in his return to the White House so far, even though he said in his social media post that he wanted to talk to him about the Putin conversation shortly. Zelenskyy and other high -ranking Ukrainian civil servants are expected to meet members of the Trump administration on the sidelines of the annual Munich security conference later this week to discuss the war.
“One day you can be Russian”: Trump
Hegseth also said on Wednesday that a return to the borders of Ukraine was unrealistic before 2014.
“The hunting of this illusionary goal will only extend the war and cause more suffering,” he added.
Conflicts in eastern Ukraine began in 2014 after a pro-Russian president was overthrown in the Ukrainian Maidan revolution. Russia soon annexed the Black Sea Peninsula of the Crimea from Ukraine and then supported pro-Russian separatists in an armed uprising against Ukrainian armed forces in the East Donbas region.
Hegseth said that “sovereign and wealthy” Ukraine was still a priority, but that Washington is exposed to “Stark Strategic Reality”, such as:
In an interview with Fox News at the beginning of this week, Trump did not seem to support the future sovereignty of Ukraine in full.
“You can complete a deal, one day you cannot be Russian, or you may not be Russian one day,” he said. Trump also said that the United States wanted access to the Ukraine minerals minerals in exchange for support.
On the campaign path last year, Trump scolded the significant military aid that Joe Biden’s administration of Ukraine has made available since Russian troops marched in in February 2022. The sum was estimated at 65 billion US dollars.
During his first term, Trump suggested Zelenskyy in a phone call that the Ukrainian leader should work together to discredit biden. The US help for Ukraine was delayed. Democrats accused Trump for what they said was a continuous Pro -quo, but Trump was later acquitted in the Senate, which was avoided by the distance from the office.
Matthew Miller, spokesman for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs During the term of office of Biden, argued on social media that the Trump administration through the public statement about the NATO membership of Ukraine “only existed one of the main impact points before the negotiations even begin”.
Russia rejects the land exchange idea
In the meantime, the Kremlin said on Wednesday that Russia will never discuss the commercial area in which it was kept in the Russia region in the Russia kept in the Russia, after the idea of Zelenskyy in public.
Russia controls almost 20 percent of Ukraine or more than 112,000 square kilometers, while Ukraine, according to the open source cards of the battlefield, controls around 450 square kilometers of the Kursk region.
In 2024, the Russian armed forces in Ukraine received the soil with the fastest sentence since 2022, the year of Russia. But the Russian profits are heavier at the expense of unknown losses in men and equipment.
Exhaustion and North Korean troops are these soldiers who fight for Ukraine that the war has to end. A CBC institution team spoke to them before they went back to the front and tried to be confiscated in the Russian region of Kursk.
Zelenskyy told the Guardian newspaper that he wanted to offer Russia a direct territory exchange in order to put an end to the war, including the offer of Kursk bags that hold Ukraine.
“We will swap a territory for another,” said Zelenskyy, adding that he did not know which part of the Russian -occupied territory would reclaim Ukraine.
“I don’t know, we will see. But all of our areas are important, there is no priority,” he said.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that Moscow categorically rejected all offers for trading territory.
“It is impossible,” he said reporters at a daily briefing. “Russia never discussed the exchange of its territory and will not discuss.”
Fatal attack in Kyiv
In the middle of the diplomatic developments, a Russian rocket salvo killed at least one civilian in the Ukrainian capital before dawn and injured four more, which had several fires in the city with three million, the Ukrainian officials said.
The Ukraine Air Force said it shot six out of seven ballistic rockets that started in the attack. Of 123 drones, the military shot 71 and probably used electronic countermeasures against 40 more.
An overnight attack also damaged the critical infrastructure and injured two people in the northern region of Tschernihiv, according to the local officials.
