Do the increasingly frequent statements about the necessity of peace talks between Kiev and Moscow mean that Ukraine is opening up to diplomatic solutions to end the war? The dilemma was ignited by Kyiv mayor Vitaly Klitschko when he mentioned the possibility of a "territorial compromise" and shot an arrow in the direction of Volodymyr Zelenskiy.
In recent weeks, the possibility of ending the Russian invasion of Ukraine at the negotiating table has been discussed again. Examples are the so-called "peace mission" of Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, which he carried out on his own, as well as the statement of the American Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump that he will "end the war within 24 hours". Former British Prime Minister Boris Johnson linked the peace plan with the territorial reality before February 2022, when the Russian invasion began. At that time, Crimea was already annexed, and parts of Luhansk and Donetsk were occupied, writes Deutsche Welle (DW).
But the real surprise was prepared by the mayor of Kyiv, Vitaliy Klitschko, when he spoke about the possibility of a territorial compromise.
So far, Ukrainian government representatives have mostly avoided such formulations. Official Kyiv insists on the 1991 borders.
"Will the president of Ukraine continue the war with further casualties and destruction, or will he have to consider a possible territorial compromise with Putin?" If they will, what will be the pressure from America in case of Trump's victory? How will they explain to their own population that they have to give up parts of the territory, for which thousands of our heroic fighters gave their lives?", said Klitschko in an interview with the newspaper "Corriere della Sera", and that in that case, President Volodymyr Zelensky would probably have to organizes a referendum on possible territorial compromises.
Do these statements mean that Ukraine is opening up to diplomatic solutions? And is it at all acceptable to the people of the country and to the Western partners?
Political showdown in Kiev?
Director of the Kyiv Center for Political Research "Penta" Volodymyr Fesenko marks the statements of the mayor of Kyiv as a "false start", because there are currently no real peace negotiations, but only initiatives and plans that are not a very good basis for negotiations, and that Klitschko makes such statements with the aim of political showdown with President Zelenski, with whom he has been in conflict for years.
"Klitschko is fueling the population's existing fear of a secret agreement." But there are no secret agreements, there are no peace negotiations yet," says Fesenko and explains that it is impossible to conclude a secret agreement anyway, because it would have to be implemented with the support of society. "That's when consent would be needed in a referendum, so that Zelenski would not make concessions on his own."
Roger Hilton of the Bratislava-based international think tank GLOBSEC says that the past two difficult years of war have forced some Ukrainian politicians to talk about possible territorial concessions. "The fact that we hear such words from the mouth of a person like Mayor Klitschko is an acknowledgment that the country is facing difficult political decisions," says this expert, adding that such statements could be an internal political test with the aim of finding out to what extent Ukrainian society supports that position. .
According to Hilton, Klitschko has never hidden that he wants to become president, so he is using the opportunity to make a political gain based on the issue of a peaceful solution. Hilton says that because of the war, presidential elections were not held this year, so such statements could be considered part of the pre-election campaign. Hilton believes that territorial concessions would be bad for Europe as well.
"I think that most of the Western allies would not accept that Ukraine would give up a part of its territory, because it would bring a series of intractable problems to Europe." In addition, globally, it would be a precedent for other authoritarian regimes, which want to illegally annex some areas", says this expert.
What concessions would Ukrainian society agree to?
According to polls, since the spring of 2023, the number of those who would be ready to make concessions in the name of peace is increasing. In May of this year, there were 32 percent of them, and in May of 2023, there were only ten percent of them. The majority of respondents, 55 percent of them, are against any territorial concessions to Russia. These are this month's data from the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology (KIIS).
If we compare the figures from the period between May 2022 and May 2023, then only eight to ten percent of respondents were ready for territorial compromises, and the vast majority - from 82 to 87 percent - were against any concessions.
Source: Deutsche says
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