LONDON — Ukraine will not surrender territory, President Volodymyr Zelensky declared Monday, rejecting a central Russian demand that President Donald Trump had incorporated into his latest proposal to end the Kremlin’s war.
“Under our laws, under international law — and under moral law — we have no right to give anything away,” Zelensky said, after meeting with top European leaders to discuss Trump’s plan Monday. “That is what we are fighting for.”
The unequivocal declaration that Ukraine will not surrender land could mark the collapse of Trump’s plan, which critics condemned as fulfilling a wish list of Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Zelensky, speaking to journalists aboard his flight to Brussels following consultations with the leaders of Britain, France and Germany in London, made one of his clearest public statements yet on the emerging U.S.-backed proposal. He said the plan had been stripped of what he called “explicitly anti-Ukrainian provisions,” suggesting that Kyiv was open to a deal.
But he stood firm on the issue of land — a view shared by European leaders who have insisted that Putin should not be permitted to redraw international boundaries by force.
Zelensky said Ukraine will not surrender its territory in the eastern Donbas region — not to hasten peace talks, not to satisfy Washington’s push for compromise and not under pressure from Moscow’s continuing military onslaught.
Ukraine and Europe have insisted that a ceasefire be declared along current battle lines, but Russia has refused. Putin has claimed, illegally, to have annexed four entire regions of Ukraine (in addition to Crimea, which Russia seized in 2014) — far more territory than his military forces have been able to occupy.
Some Ukrainian officials held out hope that the negotiations could still bear fruit.
The proposal “is closer to be doable for Ukraine, but not easy and not finished,” said a senior Ukrainian official familiar with recent discussions, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to comment publicly.
Specifically, Zelensky said one proposal involved “exchanging” Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, currently held by Russia, and swaths of Russian-occupied territory for areas of the Donetsk region still under Ukrainian control, an idea he dismissed.
Trump over the weekend again cast Kyiv as the obstacle to the American-championed proposal, accusing Zelensky of slow-walking the plan, even as Moscow has shown little, if any, willingness to compromise on its maximalist demands.
Trump’s continuing pressure, including his stern tone toward Ukraine and apparent openness to granting Putin’s territorial claims, has unnerved European capitals, heightening fears that Kyiv’s negotiating leverage is evaporating as Putin’s forces advance on the battlefield and Zelensky’s government remains consumed by a corruption scandal.
Zelensky’s immediate priority in London was to meet with senior Ukrainian officials, including Rustem Umerov, the secretary of Ukraine’s National Security and Defense Council, who held detailed consultations last week in Miami with Trump’s envoys — developer Steve Witkoff and the president’s son-in-law Jared Kushner — following their meeting with Putin in Moscow.
Zelensky said some of the new information emerging in those talks required face-to-face consultation with his team. Trump accused the Ukrainian leader of not keeping up.
“Russia is, I believe, fine with it, but I’m not sure that Zelensky’s fine with it,” Trump told reporters before taking part in the Kennedy Center Honors in Washington on Sunday. “His people love it, but he hasn’t read it.”
Even before Zelensky’s outright rejection of ceding land, Ukraine and its European supporters voiced deep apprehension about Trump’s initiative, which some said originally was so favorable to Russia that they believed it had been drafted by the Kremlin. The Europeans and Ukrainians scrambled to propose changes, including removing provisions that were unacceptable to Kyiv or that would require broader approval by nations that belong to NATO or the European Union.
Zelensky met on Monday with the British, French and German leaders at 10 Downing Street, the British prime minister’s office, to discuss security, including air defenses and financing for Ukraine’s long-term defense.
After the session in London, Zelensky flew to Brussels to consult with NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, the head of the E.U.’s executive arm.
British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said that any deal must include “hard-edged” security guarantees for Ukraine.
“Europe must stand with Ukraine, strengthening its ability to defend against relentless attacks that have left thousands without heat or light,” Starmer’s office said in a statement after the session. The leaders “also discussed positive progress made to use immobilized Russian sovereign assets to support Ukraine’s reconstruction.”
“Work will be intensified to provide Ukraine with robust security guarantees and to plan measures for the reconstruction,” the office of French President Emmanuel Macron said in a statement.
In a statement before the session, Zelensky called the ongoing dialogue with Witkoff and Kushner “constructive though not easy,” adding that “some issues can only be discussed in person.”
The most difficult hurdles — including over territory and the possible surrender of land in Ukraine’s Donbas region that Russia has yet to seize militarily — had been reserved for Zelensky to handle.
“There are some things which we can’t manage without Americans, things which we can’t manage without Europe,” Zelensky said in London. “That’s why we need to make some important decisions.”
Kyiv is hoping to secure a firmer, coordinated Western response to Trump’s proposal. European leaders have voiced support for the U.S.-led diplomacy but are wary of any settlement that locks in Russia’s territorial gains or that leaves Ukraine without solid security guarantees to prevent another Russian attack.
In Ukraine, such an attack is viewed as nearly inevitable unless the country joins NATO. At least one version of Trump’s plan called for prohibiting Ukraine from joining the alliance.
Before Monday’s meetings, as they awaited details of the latest Trump plan, European officials said they expected Zelensky to push for stronger positions on Russian sanctions, monitoring to keep Russia from cheating on ceasefire terms, and long-term military support. Ukraine argues that, given Trump’s wavering commitment to NATO and general tilt toward Moscow, only a united European front can compel Russia to make meaningful concessions.
The original version of the plan as presented by Witkoff was seen as too favorable to Moscow. Ukrainian and European diplomats, meeting with U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio in Geneva, pushed several amendments on Ukraine’s behalf. It is not clear, however, what version of the plan Witkoff and Kushner carried to their recent meeting with Putin.
The negotiations are gaining momentum as Ukraine endures one of the most difficult periods of the four-year invasion. Russian forces are advancing in the east, exploiting Ukraine’s shortages in ammunition and fighters. Moscow continues to bomb Ukraine’s electrical infrastructure, triggering rolling blackouts and widespread outages this winter.
Over the weekend, a Russian missile struck a major pharmaceutical distribution center near Kharkiv, destroying a facility that had supplied hospitals throughout besieged eastern Ukraine. Officials said it was Russia’s fifth attack on a medical warehouse and warned that the strike would disrupt production of essential medicines, adding strain to an already stressed health system.
Zelensky is overseeing Ukraine’s response to the talks as a corruption scandal continues to rip through his inner circle. His former right hand, chief of staff Andriy Yermak, resigned in November after anti-corruption authorities raided his home and office. Zelensky has yet to replace his most trusted confidant and partner, who was often seen at the negotiating table.
Umerov, who has taken over the lead on recent negotiations, is rumored to soon be implicated in the corruption investigations, which have also led to the recent resignations of the justice and energy ministers. Zelensky’s former business partner, Timur Mindich, was also swept up in the scandal, which saw some of the government’s top leaders profiting off a major kickback scheme via energy contracts.
Trump, over his 11-month push to end the fighting in Ukraine, has frequently seemed to blame Ukraine for the conflict. In February, after a “lengthy and very productive” call with Putin, Trump said Kyiv should be ready to give up on reclaiming Russian-occupied territory. In April, he said Ukrainian resistance to permanently losing Crimea was making “it so difficult to settle this war,” warning that Ukraine risked losing “the whole country.”
The Kremlin said it was keeping open contacts with the White House but had not been briefed on the latest talks between U.S. and Ukrainian officials.
Putin spokesman Dmitry Peskov applauded the lack of public detail Monday, saying that Washington’s abandonment of “megaphone diplomacy” was a positive development.
Trump, at the White House on Monday, was not asked directly about Zelensky’s remarks, but he repeated his claim that he would have prevented Russia’s invasion if he had been president at the time. Trump insisted that he wanted to prevent further deaths, a goal Ukrainians say would be accomplished most easily by Russia stopping its war and withdrawing its troops.
“We just want to see people stop from being killed,” Trump said, adding, “You got a lot of people dying, and I want to see that stopped.”
Johnson and Khudov reported from Kyiv. Mary Ilyushina in Berlin contributed to this report.
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