Trump's special envoy says Russia will not leave occupied territories of Ukraine
Photo: US Presidential Special Envoy Keith Kellogg (Getty Images)
Russia will not give up control over the occupied territories of Ukraine, but they do not legally belong to Moscow. This creates a complicated situation requiring further negotiations, says US President Donald Trump's special envoy, Keith Kellogg.
He noted that Russia actually controls the Luhansk region, but Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, and Kherson regions only partially. This, in turn, raises questions.
"So the question is now, what does this look like? What does the territorial gains look like?" asked Kellogg.
The Special Envoy emphasized that in any scenario of the end of the war, it is important to distinguish between actual and legal control. Russia holds the occupied territories and is not going to leave them, but from the point of view of law, these lands remain Ukrainian.
"And then you have to go back to what we call either de facto or de jure. De facto meaning, okay, you physically occupy the territory, they're not going to move off it. But you don't go to de jure and say, you've totally annexed it, we give it to you as a part of Russia. Those are the discussions that are going to have to take place," said the Trump team representative.
Kellogg explained that in his opinion, in order to find a political solution, it is necessary to understand the positions of both sides. After that, a compromise must be found that will at least partially satisfy both Ukraine and Russia. At the same time, he added that neither side will get everything it wants.
“I think what you have to do is get what I would call term sheets. What do the Ukrainians want? What do the Russians want? Then you kind of merge them and say, OK, what is going to work for both sides? Do you get to an agreeable situation? I think that's going to be the important step, is what do they both want? What do they both not want? And by the way, neither side is going to be totally satisfied, because both sides are not going to get totally what they want,” he summarized.
Zelenskyy on US-Russian talks on Ukrainian territories
The other day, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that the United States was discussing the issue of territories with Russia during negotiations to end the war. However, there are no agreements with Kyiv on this issue.
The president said that he thought the American side was talking to the Russians about the territories. He mentioned that they were concerned that the United States should influence Russia, not the other way around. He added that it was clear they were raising the issue of territories, but there had been no agreements with them on the territories. He also stated that they knew it was a sensitive issue
