KYIV, Dec 20 (Reuters) – President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Saturday that Ukraine would back a U.S. proposal for three-sided talks with the United States and Russia if it facilitated more exchanges of prisoners and paved the way for meetings of national leaders.
Zelenskiy, speaking to local journalists in Kyiv, also said top Ukrainian negotiator Rustem Umerov had told him of the latest discussions that took place on Friday with U.S. negotiators in the United States.
A new round was scheduled for Saturday, he said, focusing on Ukraine’s post-war recovery. Russian special envoy Kirill Dmitriev was also in Miami for talks with U.S. officials.
Zelenskiy said the United States was now proposing three-sided talks — the United States, Ukraine and Russia — at the level of national security advisers.
“If such a meeting could be held now to allow for swaps of prisoners of war or if a meeting of national security advisers achieves agreement on a leaders’ meeting…I cannot be opposed. We would support such a U.S. proposal. Let’s see how things go.”
Zelenskiy said Ukraine stood for proposals that would leave the “contact line” where it was without Ukraine having to give up territory it still controlled in the industrial region of Donbas in eastern Ukraine.
“For me, the fair version is we stand where we are now standing,” he said.
“This is a matter of principle. Whatever the format and however we approach the issue, it is important for us that Ukrainian authorities retain control over that part of Donbas that we control now.”
He said a U.S. proposal to create a “free economic zone” in eastern Ukraine was a matter “to be decided by the people of Ukraine”.
“We are carefully working on every point, on every step in order to achieve not a vague ‘understanding’ about the division of territory and resources, but an agreement on stable and lasting peace and reliable security guarantees,” he said.
Zelenskiy also said Ukraine and its European allies should continue to support the current U.S.-led peace talks, a format that was worth “fighting for”, while adding: “If it doesn’t work out, we will all think about other options.”
Zelenskiy was responding to a question about remarks by French President Emmanuel Macron suggesting that Europe would have to re-engage in direct talks with Russia if the U.S.-led efforts founder.
Zelenskiy earlier said he would discuss the new U.S. proposal for three-sided talks with Umerov.
Ukraine and Russia have not negotiated face to face since July, but U.S.-backed shuttle diplomacy to end the almost four-year-old war in Ukraine has intensified in recent weeks.
(Reporting by Yuliia Dysa, editing by Mark Heinrich, Ron Popeski and Franklin Paul)
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