Trump–Putin Talks: Why This Won’t Be Another Minsk Surrender

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Amid a flood of grim insider leaks ahead of Donald Trump’s planned meeting with the world’s top war criminal, it’s hard not to think back to events a decade ago — namely, the infamous Minsk Agreements.

Those agreements that even the most indifferent actors shattered at the first opportunity. Those agreements that Bankova invariably referred to in the most negative terms. They insisted there would be no new “Minsk.” And indeed, there would not be — because diplomatic chess is not a matter of banging away at a grand piano with a stick.

One can endlessly juggle phrases about what Ukraine gained — and simultaneously did not lose — by signing the Package of Measures for the Implementation of those agreements.

For example, the document contained not a single clause limiting the size of the Ukrainian army, nor any provisions concerning control over the arming or rearming of our forces. The enemy was stopped. Mariupol, Bakhmut, Sievierodonetsk, Avdiivka, and countless other cities, towns, and villages could breathe again. No one demanded the restoration of the Russian language status. No one even hinted at the compulsory non-aligned status of our country. All these demands appeared later — in the spring of 2022, in Istanbul — and were imposed on our so-called delegation. These are precisely the points Putin is now pressing.

I have said this many times, and I will say it again: back then, during the brutal negotiations in Minsk, Petro Poroshenko and his team, having effectively outmaneuvered Putin, secured for Ukraine the most valuable resource imaginable. Its monetary value is incalculable. That resource was time. Not a week or three months — years. We obtained visa-free travel and the Tomos. The rearmament of the Ukrainian army began. And had the new authorities — all these specialists in publicly discrediting Ukraine, these political opportunists and self-styled graduates of the “Truskavets Academy of Near Eastern Sciences” — simply maintained the rearmament pace of the Armed Forces, then 24 February 2022 might have been nothing more than an ordinary winter day.

There will be no “Minsk-3.” Even the sparrows on Khreshchatyk understand this. What lies ahead is the first “Alaska” or “Istanbul.” And I fear we will be presented not with negotiations, but with a concise list of conditions — and it will be metaphorically nailed to our foreheads so that we cannot possibly lose it.

By the way, European leaders issued a joint statement in support of Ukraine ahead of Donald Trump’s planned meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin. 26 of the 27 leaders of the European Union have made their position public, except Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán.

As a reminder, Trump announced that on Friday, August 15, he will travel to Russia, where he plans to meet with Kremlin leader Vladimir Putin.

As reported, European politicians and the Ukrainian leadership sharply commented on the meeting between US President Donald Trump and Russian leader Vladimir Putin in Alaska scheduled for August 15. They emphasized that the future of Ukraine and the security of Europe cannot be decided without the direct participation of Kyiv and Brussels.

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