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The Weekly paper of the New Communist Party of Britain

Ukraine: Peace talks begin but the guns still blaze

By New Worker correspondent

Russian, American and Ukrainian representatives got round the table to talk peace in the Emirates last week. The Western European powers wanted to participate but they were excluded from the talks, largely due to Russian objections, and the Americans accepted the need to take Russian security interests in Europe into account in any future settlement. But little else came out of the meetings in Abu Dhabi apart from another prisoner-of-war exchange and an agreement to resume negotiations in the not too distant future.

Perhaps not surprising as the Ukrainians still won’t go beyond a standstill cease-fire while the Russians say they will settle for nothing less that the surrender of parts of the Donbas and southern Ukraine still held by Ukrainian troops.

This was the first formal trilateral negotiations since February. The American team was led by Donald Trump’s special envoys, Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner. The Kremlin side was headed by Putin’s aide, Vladimir Medinsky, and the Zelensky regime was represented by Ukrainian intelligence chief Rustem Umerov. Medinsky said European security was the central theme of the Abu Dhabi talks, and that all sides had found common ground on some issues while differences remain on others. Territory remained the major stumbling block – something Kushner said was the hardest issue to resolve. Medinsky told the Russian media that “every inch of our land will be returned to Russia, one way or another”. The Ukrainians however are refusing to budge in the perhaps mistaken belief that they can always count on the UK, France and Germany and the rest of the EU pack to back them up and that Trump is now too weak to over-ride them.

Some European leaders believe that the division of Ukraine into American and Russian spheres of influence had been agreed, at least in principle, by Putin and Trump at their summit in Alaska last year. The Russian sphere of influence would include at least what they already hold. But the lion’s share – with all its precious minerals and rare earths would go to the Americans. The Europeans get nothing. And that’s why they want a seat at the negotiating table – to get what they think is a fair return for all the money and arms they pumped into Ukraine to keep the war going.

But they don’t have a strong hand to play with. The European powers are themselves largely dependent on the United States on energy and defence. Though they stood up to Trump over his absurd claims on Canada and Greenland they were left spluttering on the sidelines when he unilaterally broke the Western sanctions regime to import the Russian diesel the American home market so desperately needs. And they know that at the end of the day there is little they can do to stop Trump cutting a deal over their heads to end the conflict.