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Reuters

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky won diplomatic backing from Europe and the Nato alliance on Sunday ahead of a Russia-US summit this week where Kyiv fears Russian President Vladimir Putin and US President Donald Trump may try to dictate terms for ending the three-and-a-half-year war.
Trump, who for weeks had been threatening new sanctions against Russia for failing to halt the war, announced instead on Friday that he would meet Putin on August 15 in Alaska.
A White House official has said Trump is open to Zelensky attending but preparations are under way for only a bilateral meeting.
Russian strikes injured at least 12 in Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia region, the country’s foreign affairs ministry said on Sunday.
Zelensky, responding to the strike, said: “That is why sanctions are needed, pressure is needed.”
The Kremlin leader last week ruled out meeting Zelensky, saying conditions for such an encounter were “unfortunately still far” from being met.
Trump said a potential deal would involve “some swapping of territories to the betterment of both [sides]”, compounding Ukrainian fears that it may face pressure to surrender land.


Zelensky says any decisions taken without Ukraine will be “stillborn” and unworkable. On Saturday the leaders of Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Poland, Finland and the European Commission said any diplomatic solution must protect the security interests of Ukraine and Europe.
“The US has the power to force Russia to negotiate seriously,” EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said on Sunday. “Any deal between the US and Russia must have Ukraine and the EU included, for it is a matter of Ukraine’s and the whole of Europe’s security.”
EU foreign ministers will meet on Monday to discuss next steps, she said.
Nato Secretary General Mark Rutte told US network ABC News that Friday’s summit “will be about testing Putin, how serious he is on bringing this terrible war to an end”.
He added: “It will be, of course, about security guarantees, but also about the absolute need to acknowledge that Ukraine decides on its own future, that Ukraine has to be a sovereign nation, deciding on its own geopolitical future.”
Russia holds nearly a fifth of the country.
Rutte said a deal could not include legal recognition of Russian control over Ukrainian land, although it might include de facto recognition. He compared it to the situation after World War Two when Washington accepted that the Baltic states of Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia were de facto controlled by the Soviet Union but did not legally recognise their annexation.
Zelensky said on Sunday: “The end of the war must be fair and I am grateful to everyone who stands with Ukraine and our people today.”

A European official said Europe had come up with a counterproposal to Trump’s, but declined to provide details. Russian officials accused Europe of trying to thwart Trump’s efforts to end the war.
“The Euro-imbeciles are trying to prevent American efforts to help resolve the Ukrainian conflict,” former Russian president Dmitry Medvedev posted on social media on Sunday.
Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said in a statement that the relationship between Ukraine and the European Union resembled “necrophilia”.
Roman Alekhin, a Russian war blogger, said Europe had been reduced to the role of a spectator.
“If Putin and Trump reach an agreement directly, Europe will be faced with a fait accompli. Kyiv – even more so,” he said.
In addition to Crimea, which it seized in 2014, Russia has formally claimed the Ukrainian regions of Luhansk, Donetsk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia as its own, although it controls only about 70 per cent of the last three. It holds smaller pieces of territory in three other regions, while Ukraine says it holds a sliver of Russia’s Kursk region.
Sergei Markov, a pro-Kremlin analyst, said a swap could entail Russia handing over 1,500 sq km (579 sq miles) to Ukraine and obtaining 7,000 sq km, which he said Russia would capture anyway within about six months.
He provided no evidence to back any of those figures. Russia took about 500 sq km of territory in July, according to Western military analysts who say its grinding advances have come at the cost of very high casualties.

Ukraine and its European allies have been haunted for months by the fear that Trump, keen to claim credit for making peace and hoping to seal lucrative joint business deals between the US and Russia, could align with Putin to cut a deal that would be deeply disadvantageous to Kyiv.
They had drawn some encouragement lately as Trump, having piled heavy pressure on Zelensky and berated him publicly in the Oval Office in February, began criticising Putin as Russia pounded Kyiv and other cities with its heaviest air attacks of the war.
But the impending Putin-Trump summit has revived fears that Kyiv and Europe could be sidelined.
“What we will see emerge from Alaska will almost certainly be a catastrophe for Ukraine and Europe,” wrote Phillips P O’Brien, professor of strategic studies at the University of St Andrews in Scotland.
“And Ukraine will face the most terrible dilemma. Do they accept this humiliating and destructive deal? Or do they go it alone, unsure of the backing of European states?”
Ukrainian political analyst Volodymyr Fesenko said on Sunday that Kyiv’s partnership with its European allies was critical to countering any attempts to keep it away from the table.
“For us right now, a joint position with the Europeans is our main resource,” he said on Ukrainian radio.
US Vice-President J.D. Vance said a negotiated settlement was unlikely to satisfy either side.
“Both the Russians and the Ukrainians, probably, at the end of the day, are going to be unhappy with it,” he said on Fox News’ Sunday Morning Futures with Maria Bartiromo.


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Ukraine war

Zelensky wins EU, Nato backing as he seeks place at Trump-Putin talks

From left, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, US President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin. Photos: Various sources / AFP / Ukrainian Presidential Press Service

US Vice-President J.D. Vance. Photo: Pool via Reuters

Ukrainian rescuers and policemen work at the site of a Russian strike on a bus station in Zaporizhzhia, Ukraine on Sunday. Photo: EPA

Ahead of US-Russia summit, Zelensky warns against ‘decisions without Ukraine’

Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky during a meeting on August 4 with frontline soldiers at an undisclosed location in the Kharkiv region, amid the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Photo: Ukrainian Presidential Press Service / AFP

A combination photo of Russian President Vladimir Putin (left) and his US counterpart Donald Trump. Photo: AFP

Trump says he will meet Putin in Alaska on August 15 for Ukraine talks

US President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin shake hands before a meeting in Helsinki in July 2018. Photo: AFP

Putin keeps Xi in the loop on Trump summit but little hope of lasting Ukraine ceasefire

The call between Russian President Vladimir Putin (right) and his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping on Friday underscored a high level of coordination between Beijing and Moscow in their approach to Washington. Photo: RIA Novosti via Reuters

US auctioning off seized US$325 million Russian superyacht with helipad, pool, gym and spa

The superyacht Amadea sails into the San Diego Bay in June 2022. Photo: AP

Ukraine gets ‘badly needed’ US arms under Nato scheme with Netherlands weapons purchase

A US-made MIM-104 Patriot surface-to-air missile is launched during a drill in Taiwan. The Dutch package includes US Patriot missile parts. Photo: AFP

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky stands in front of a “Patriot” anti-aircraft missile system during his visit to a military training area last year. Photo: dpa

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Russia & Central Asia

The US is open to a summit involving Putin and Zelensky but for now is planning a bilateral meeting in Alaska as requested by Russia


The US is open to a summit involving Putin and Zelensky but for now is planning a bilateral meeting in Alaska as requested by Russia.


Zelensky wins EU, Nato backing as he seeks place at Trump-Putin talks

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}The US is open to a summit involving Putin and Zelensky but for now is planning a bilateral meeting in Alaska as requested by Russia

The US is open to a summit involving Putin and Zelensky but for now is planning a bilateral meeting in Alaska as requested by Russia