Washington has raised the possibility of Ukraine pulling its remaining troops out of the eastern Donbas region in return for Nato membership, President Volodymyr Zelensky has revealed, in what appears to be a significant shift in the diplomatic push to end the war with Russia.
Speaking to reporters on Saturday, Zelensky said the idea was presented by American negotiators during a fresh round of shuttle diplomacy that has seen US envoys travel to Moscow and to an EU summit in Dublin.
A Proposal Raised for the First Time
According to the Ukrainian leader, the question was framed directly: if Ukraine were to join the Western military alliance, would it be willing to withdraw from the Donbas? Zelensky noted that this was the first occasion on which such a trade-off had been put on the table.
Kyiv has consistently sought Nato membership as a cornerstone of any peace settlement, viewing it as the only credible safeguard against future Russian aggression. Moscow, by contrast, has long insisted that a further Nato member on its border is unacceptable.
Zelensky has also repeatedly maintained that Ukraine will not surrender sovereign territory, despite the Kremlin's demands that it hand over the Donbas.
Referendum Condition Set Out
The president indicated he would not decide such a matter alone. He said that if he were presented with a proposal containing firm security guarantees, no limits on the size of Ukraine's armed forces and funding for the country's reconstruction, he would submit it to a national referendum.
The comments follow a week of intense diplomacy. US envoys Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff met Zelensky in the Irish capital on Thursday, a day after holding talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow.
Readings of those discussions suggest the Kremlin's position has not softened. Russian officials continue to demand territorial concessions, restrictions on Ukraine's military and guaranteed neutrality, conditions Kyiv has rejected as crippling its ability to defend itself.
Signs of Common Ground
Despite the gap between the sides, there have been modest signs of cooperation. Last month, US First Lady Melania Trump helped broker a temporary ceasefire in the Russian-occupied city of Oleshky, allowing evacuations and the delivery of humanitarian aid.
US officials had previously stated that Ukrainian Nato membership was not on the table. Zelensky said the latest American proposal had led him to believe that the alliance question is once again part of the conversation, though he warned that Putin's signals make the path ahead extremely difficult.
Russia currently controls roughly one fifth of Ukrainian territory, including most of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions that make up the Donbas. Handing over the small pockets of land Ukraine still holds there would be a limited concession in practical terms, but it would carry heavy symbolic weight for Kyiv, effectively amounting to an acceptance of Russian control over the region.
Zelensky has previously vowed to retake Russian-held territory across four Ukrainian regions as well as the Crimean peninsula, which Moscow annexed in 2014.
