KYIV (The Thursday Times) — US negotiators have asked for the first time whether Ukraine would pull its remaining forces out of the eastern Donbas region if it were admitted to NATO, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said, a sign that membership of the alliance may be back on the table in talks to end Russia’s war.
“The Americans raised a question: ‘What if Ukraine joins NATO? Would Ukraine withdraw from Donbas?’ This was the first time this had been raised,” Zelenskyy told reporters.
He said that if Washington and other NATO members confirmed such an offer, he would put it to the Ukrainian people. “If the American side confirms this to us together with other NATO colleagues, then I will ask the opinion of our society: do we accept or do we not accept? I do not have the right not to do this at my own discretion. But specifics are needed, which do not exist yet, and all of this is under discussion,” he said.
Any package would need to include binding security guarantees, no limits on Ukraine’s armed forces, and money to rebuild the country, Zelenskyy said. He also ruled out any legal recognition of occupied Ukrainian land as Russian. “Undoubtedly, without any recognition of occupied territories as Russian,” he said.
A small area with a large meaning
Russia occupies roughly a fifth of Ukraine, including most of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions that make up the Donbas. Moscow has demanded that Kyiv hand over the rest of the region, accept limits on the size of its military, and stay out of NATO. Ukraine has rejected those terms, and Russia has said it will not accept another member of the alliance on its border.
The part of the Donbas still under Ukrainian control is small, but withdrawing from it would amount to accepting that the region is Russian, which Kyiv has always refused to do. US officials had previously said NATO membership for Ukraine was off the table.
Zelenskyy said the US question made him believe that “NATO is back on the agenda”, but he urged caution. “You have also heard Putin’s signals, and this is an extremely difficult conversation,” he said.
He said he had warned the US negotiators that Russian President Vladimir Putin could not be trusted. “When Putin says something about state borders, it is certainly not about reducing Russia’s territory, right? Therefore, there is no faith in the comrade in the Kremlin,” he said.
A busy week of diplomacy
The question came during the latest round of US diplomacy. The US envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner held talks with Putin at the Kremlin and then met Zelenskyy in Dublin, where European leaders had gathered for the European Political Community summit. Those meetings followed US-mediated talks between Russian and Ukrainian delegations in Abu Dhabi on November 10 and 11.
Europe has since named a five-nation team for the next round, and the Kremlin has denied a report that it demanded Finland leave NATO.
Zelenskyy said full NATO membership, with a guarantee modelled on the alliance’s Article 5 mutual defence clause, was the minimum Ukraine needed to deter a future invasion. He said some partners had suggested bilateral arrangements instead, similar to US commitments to Israel or to Gulf states, with American bases, naval and air deployments, and Patriot air defence systems. He said such models were possible but that he was wary of relying on them.
Denmark and the other Nordic countries strongly support Ukraine joining NATO, Zelenskyy said. He met Nordic leaders in Copenhagen on Tuesday, before travelling to Dublin.
