Forever War: Zelensky, Western Leaders Reject Putin Ceasefire Proposals at Swiss Peace Summit

Western leaders rejected Vladimir Putin’s framework for a ceasefire while backing Ukraine’s demands that Russia return all occupied territories as the basis for any potential peace agreement.

The “first annual Global Peace Summit” held in the luxury Swiss resort of Burgenstock, which did not include any representatives from Moscow, concluded with the status quo essentially remaining the same, with Ukraine continuing to demand that Russia cede territory in the East and Crimea as a prerequisite for actual peace talks to begin, a likely non-starter for Vladimir Putin.

Following the conclusion of the meeting, which saw around 100 delegates from 92 countries and eight international organisations attend, President Zelensky claimed that all participants agreed that Ukraine’s “territorial integrity” must be kept intact, Ukrinform reports.

Despite Ukraine failing to recapture the occupied regions in the Donbas during last year’s counteroffensive, Zelenksy’s chief-of-staff Andriy Yermak said that there would be “no compromise on independence, sovereignty and territorial integrity” in any peace negotiations with Russia.

Before the summit, Vladimir Putin said that Russia would be willing to agree to a ceasefire and potential peace with Ukraine if Kyiv withdraws its troops from the mostly ethnically Russian territories, which Moscow now claims sovereignty over, citing the internationally contested referenda held in the regions to join Russia.

Additionally, Putin demanded that Ukraine forfeit its ambitions to join the American-led NATO military alliance, state media RT reports. Moscow also proposed a “pan-European security architecture” in which all countries on the continent, including Ukraine, would be protected. For this, Putin said that all foreign military operations must cease in Ukraine.

Such demands were rejected by the Western leaders present at the Swiss summit. German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said per Kyiv state media Ukrinform: “Everyone knows that this is an unserious proposal, but it is related to the peace conference that is taking place in Switzerland. At the same time, Putin has also shown what he is really interested in – a classic imperialist conquest of territories.

“To this end, he employed great military power, unleashed a brutal war, and also resigned himself to the fact that hundreds of thousands of Russian soldiers died or were seriously injured for the sake of his imperialist dream.”

This sentiment was shared by other European leaders, with French President Emmanuel Macron saying that peace cannot mean the “surrender of Ukraine,” adding: “That is why the prerequisite is to help Ukraine in resisting this aggression because there is one aggressor and his victim.”

Meanwhile, UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak accused Putin of “spinning a phoney narrative about his willingness to negotiate,” the BBC reports.

For her part, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said that “freezing the conflict today with foreign troops occupying Ukrainian land is not an answer… In fact, it is a recipe for future wars of aggression.”

“It is important for Ukraine to have a fair and just peace and Ukraine should be able not to subscribe to any dictates from Putin, but to act in its own interest,” she explained.

The summit in Switzerland came in the wake of the leaders of the G7 countries agreeing to use the interest on $325bn (£256bn) in seized Russian assets to pay the $3 billion in annual interest on a $50 billion loan taken out by Ukraine from international markets to fund its war effort.

On top of that, the Biden administration signed a 10-year bilateral security deal with Ukraine on Thursday in which the United States will commit to continue providing arms and military training for at least the next decade.

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