Ukraine may need to hold a referendum on territorial changes as part of an agreement with Russia, Johann Wadephul has said<\/p>\n
An end to the Ukraine conflict will most likely require \u201cpainful concessions\u201d from Kiev, including on territorial issues, German Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul has said. Its chance to stop the hostilities has \u201cnever been greater\u201d than now, he told Neue Osnabrucker Zeitung (NOZ) on Tuesday.
\nHis words came ahead of a meeting between US President Donald Trump\u2019s special envoy, Steve Witkoff, and Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow. They are expected to discuss the peace plan for ending the Ukraine conflict put forward by Washington last month.
\nThe details of the initial plan have not officially been made public, but the media reported that it requires Ukraine to cede parts of Donbass (the Donetsk People\u2019s Republic and Lugansk People\u2019s Republic) it still controls, abandon its NATO bid, and accept limits on its military. Russia has cautiously welcomed the initiative, saying that many points of the plan are acceptable, but added that it expects the proposal to be modified by all sides.<\/p>\n
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\u201cIt is the task of diplomacy to work out compromises that the conflicting parties can support. Ultimately, this will certainly always involve painful concessions,\u201d Wadephul said, commenting on the prospects of a negotiated settlement. According to the minister, Ukraine would need to hold a referendum on the peace conditions, including territorial concessions. He also maintained that Kiev should be offered security \u201cassurances\u201d in exchange.
\nUkraine\u2019s Vladimir Zelensky had previously named territorial issues as being among the most difficult points to resolve. The nation\u2019s military have been losing ground for months to the continued Russian advance. On Monday, the chief of Russia\u2019s General Staff, Valery Gerasimov, reported taking control over the key frontline city of Krasnoarmeysk (Pokrovsk) in the Donetsk People\u2019s Republic.
\nKiev\u2019s Western backers in Europe derided Trump\u2019s initial plan as favoring Russia too much and put forward a set of their own conditions for achieving peace, which Moscow dismissed as \u201cunconstructive.\u201d
\nGermany has been one of Ukraine\u2019s key supporters and arms suppliers in the conflict. Berlin\u2019s position has further hardened under the current government led by Chancellor Friedrich Merz, who had previously claimed that all diplomatic options had been \u201cexhausted\u201d and his nation was \u201calready in a conflict\u201d with Russia.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Ukraine may need to hold a referendum on territorial changes as part of an agreement with Russia, Johann Wadephul has said An end to the Ukraine conflict will most likely…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":23601,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":[],"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","footnotes":""},"categories":[4,6,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-23600","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-economy","category-environment","category-politics"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t