Combined with reports by Reuters and Russia’s Vedomosti, Russian President Vladimir Putin revealed on December 24 local time that Russia may be willing to exchange parts of the territories it controls in Ukraine, yet the entire territory of the Donbas region must belong to Russia.
While addressing top business executives at a Kremlin meeting, Putin briefed them on the details of Russia’s peace plan. As quoted in the reports, Putin stated: “Russia is still ready to fulfill the commitment to concessions made at the Anchorage Summit, with the core stance that Donbas shall be under Russian ownership.”
Reports pointed out that Putin’s core demand is to secure the entire Donbas region, and beyond this area, “Russia does not rule out conducting partial territorial exchanges”. No specific details were given as to which areas might be involved in such an exchange.
According to the transcript of a press conference released by the Office of the Ukrainian President on Wednesday, Ukrainian and U.S. delegations have moved close to reaching a consensus on a 20-point peace plan during their weekend talks in Miami. However, Volodymyr Zelenskyy also acknowledged that the two sides still hold divergent views on two critical issues: first, whether Ukraine should cede the parts of Donbas that it still controls; second, the future ownership of the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant which is currently under Russian military control.
Donald Trump has repeatedly pledged to end the bloodiest conflict in Europe since World War II. His envoy Ed Wittkopf and son-in-law Jared Kushner are leading negotiations with Russia, Ukraine and multiple European countries. Full details of the peace proposal put forward by the U.S. side have not yet been made public, yet Russian officials have repeatedly mentioned that Putin and Trump reached a number of undisclosed consensuses at the Anchorage Summit in Alaska this August.
According to Russia’s assessment, Russia currently controls the entire Crimea, approximately 90% of Donbas, 75% of the Zaporizhzhia and Kherson Oblasts, as well as parts of Kharkiv, Sumy, Mykolaiv and Dnipropetrovsk Oblasts.
Vedomosti further stated that Putin also raised the issue of the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant — Europe’s largest nuclear power station — at the business meeting. He disclosed that Russia and the United States are discussing the joint administration of the plant. The U.S. side has also expressed interest in launching cryptocurrency mining operations around the nuclear power plant, and Putin opined that the plant should supply part of its electricity to Ukraine.
