On Sunday (8 December), US President-elect Donald Trump called for an immediate ceasefire and negotiations between Ukraine and Russia to end “the madness,” prompting Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and the Kremlin to lay out their requirements.
Trump’s remarks came only hours after visiting Zelenskyy in Paris for their first face-to-face meeting since Trump won the US presidential election last month. Trump has promised to bring the situation to an end through negotiation, but he has not provided any details thus yet.
“Zelenskyy and Ukraine would like to make a deal and stop the madness,” Trump wrote on his social media platform Truth Social, adding that Kyiv had lost some 400,000 soldiers. “There should be an immediate ceasefire and negotiations should begin.”
“I know Vladimir well. This is his time to act. China can help. The World is waiting!” Trump added, referring to Russian President Putin.
Trump, in Paris for the reopening of Notre-Dame Cathedral, sat down with Zelenskyy on Saturday for about an hour, along with host President Emmanuel Macron.
Trump and Zelenskyy shook hands and smiled, but it was unclear how the conversation had gone. Accounts of the talks from the French and Ukrainian sides said only that the discussions had been good and productive.
Zelenskyy reacted to Trump’s message on Sunday saying peace was not just a piece of paper, but needed guarantees.
“When we talk about effective peace with Russia, we must first and foremost talk about effective guarantees for peace. Ukrainians want peace more than anyone else,” he said on X.
“It (the war) cannot simply end with a piece of paper and a few signatures. A ceasefire without guarantees can be reignited at any moment, as Putin has already done before. To ensure that Ukrainians no longer suffer losses, we must guarantee the reliability of peace and not turn a blind eye to occupation.”
It appeared Trump’s figure of 400,000 Ukrainian soldiers lost in the war meant both killed and wounded. Zelenskyy said 43,000 soldiers had been killed in the war and that there had been 370,000 wounded soldiers.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov convened a conference call with reporters to address Trump’s comments.
Peskov said Russia was open to talks, but that they had to be based on agreements reached in Istanbul in 2022 and on current realities on the battlefield where Russian forces have been pushing forward at their fastest rate since the early days of the war in 2022.
Putin has said repeatedly that a preliminary agreement reached between Russian and Ukrainian negotiators in the first weeks of the war at talks in Istanbul, which was never implemented, could serve as the basis for future talks.
“Our position on Ukraine is well known,” said Peskov.
“The conditions for an immediate stop to hostilities were set out by President Putin in his speech to the Russian Foreign Ministry in June of this year. It is important to recall that it was Ukraine that refused and continues to refuse negotiations,” he said.
Putin has stated that Ukraine should not join the NATO military alliance and that Russia should be allowed to fully rule four Ukrainian districts that his soldiers currently hold in order to reach a peace agreement.
Peskov highlighted that Zelenskyy had issued a special edict prohibiting communication with the Russian leadership, which Peskov stated would need to be rescinded if negotiations were to start.
