The meeting between the United States and Ukraine in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, marked the beginning of possible breakthroughs in peace negotiations with the Russian Federation. US President Trump and his Ukrainian counterpart Zelensky agreed on a set of conditions for a 30-day ceasefire, passing the ball to the Russian Federation on further actions to be taken for a possible cessation of hostilities. However, a number of questions remain unresolved: What kind of security guarantees will be provided to Ukraine? Can relations with Washington be considered restored again? And what about Ukraine's post-war future in terms of reconstruction?
We discussed these issues with Oleksandr Merezhko, Chairman of the Committee on Foreign Policy and Interparliamentary Relations of the Ukrainian Parliament, Deputy of the Verkhovna Rada for the party Servant of the People since the 2019 elections and member of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe from 2020 to 2024.
This week, the United States and Ukraine reached an agreement in Jeddah for a temporary ceasefire that – if accepted by Putin – will theoretically last 30 days. Do you think this is a good starting point for negotiations? Will Russia accept and respect the ceasefire in your opinion?
For us, this is a good starting point. The positive aspect of these talks, in my opinion, is the resumption of military aid and intelligence sharing with Ukraine. In terms of our defense capabilities, military aid from the West helps us defend ourselves and save our lives. This is the most important aspect.
Another positive aspect that I see is the improvement of relations with the current US administration. The political advantage of this outcome is that Putin is now in a very difficult situation: as a result of these talks, Ukraine has demonstrated its will to achieve peace and its willingness to accept the US proposal unconditionally. Now the ball is in Russia's court, and I am sure it does not know what to do. Putin is a cheat, a pathological liar, but rejecting the proposal would mean having to face very serious consequences. Trump will certainly punish him, and not only him, but the entire world. The South of the world, for example: those countries are experiencing first-hand who wants peace and who does not.
So, the proposal is an encouraging development, but I am very skeptical that Putin can respect the ceasefire. All previous experience has shown that Putin never respects ceasefires. I was deputy head of the Ukrainian delegation in the trilateral contact group in the past and I remember very clearly that we had thousands of ceasefires in the past under the Minsk agreement. Each time Putin violated them. Maybe Trump needs to have his own direct and personal experience, to realize that Putin is not a person who can be trusted and who cannot be believed. He will violate what he thinks is in his interest, whether it is an agreement or a ceasefire. As soon as Trump realizes this, I am sure he will be more pragmatic and realistic with Putin, which means he will be more coercive in forcing him to make peace. This is what we call “the policy of peace through force,” and I think that right now the situation is very optimistic. But again, regarding the ceasefire we need more force and pressure against Russia and Putin, and of course we continue to need security guarantees for Ukraine.
The key question for us is what can discourage Putin, what can act as a deterrent in his mind? In our opinion, it is NATO membership.
What security guarantees are we talking about in concrete terms? And what, in your opinion, is the real prospect of Ukraine joining NATO?
First of all, even though we are often told that it is now unrealistic and that Trump is against it, we should not remove Ukraine's entry into NATO from the game. We should continue to knock on NATO's door because we have understood that if we want to survive, the best guarantee for our security is membership in the Atlantic Alliance. We cannot afford to give up this possibility.
Interestingly, Trump himself was asked during one of his interviews what was the most valuable advice he would give to other people. He answered "never give up". So, it means that we should not give up on NATO membership, but at the same time we should also consider other options.
In any case, we should be realistic and remember the question I asked earlier about what really deters Putin from attacking us again after the ceasefire. There were some ideas from our European allies, who talked about a "coalition of the willing" with French President Macron at the helm. I am not sure about that because, so far, it does not seem to me to be a solution that is effective enough compared to NATO membership. But we can work in that direction.
Among the proposals coming from Europe, how do you evaluate the possibility of having peacekeepers Europeans in Ukraine?
I think any talk about the presence of Western or European troops in Ukraine is positive. In itself, it makes Putin very nervous and shows that Europe is on Ukraine's side and that we are not alone. On the other hand, it remains an open question: what do we mean by "peacekeeper"? There are different models, such as the UN model of peacekeeping operations. It was used only when the parties to the conflict agreed on a long-lasting and stable ceasefire that did not endanger the lives of peacekeepers. This is one scenario, but it takes a long time and I am not sure it is realistic enough.
Another model is peace enforcement, the so-called “peace enforcement”, which means that in case of a ceasefire violation there will be a strong reaction from the peacekeepers. Again, what is important here is to calculate what is going on in Putin’s mind, whether he will attack Europe’s peacekeepers or not. He is very evil and cynical, and nothing can stop him from committing provocations. That is why we should think very carefully, to find stable and lasting solutions.
To have classic peacekeeping operations, you need the agreement of both sides. In this case, I don't think we will get this support from Putin, that's why maybe we should think about something else. This idea is welcome, but it needs to be considered carefully to make it work.
Do you see the possibility of Ukraine joining the European Union in the near future?
I have no doubt that Ukraine will become a member of the European Union, but I see this issue from the point of view of our security and I will explain why. First, we have the example of Finland. For a long time it was not a member of NATO but only a member of the EU, and Putin never dared to attack the country precisely because of this. Being a member of the European Union was a guarantee of security in itself. Putin knew that as soon as he attacked Finland, a number of other states – 27* - would have provided all kinds of military aid. That is why if I were a Western or EU leader I would admit Ukraine into the EU as soon as possible, even tomorrow, considering the issue as a political and security issue. Putin officially has nothing against the EU, he is against NATO.
If I were a leader of the EU, I would also immediately start discussions on a common security and defense policy, perhaps even moving towards the creation of a European army. For me, this is a question of security especially at this time.
Besides security issues, what are Ukraine's future challenges?
At the moment, we are mainly concerned about how to survive. There are obviously many challenges, especially from an economic point of view. Our economy has been destroyed by the Russian attacks, especially critical infrastructure. It will take years and financial resources to rebuild and restore our economy. We need not only to rebuild our economic fabric, but also a transformation to make our country advanced. To use this conflict situation also as an opportunity to change our economic structure and make it a sort of Singapore model or something like that.
Another important challenge for me is the need to consider that millions of Ukrainians have left the country as refugees and are now living in other parts of the world. Under what conditions should they return? We should create a Ukraine that seems attractive to them. When they return and see ruins, what prospects remain?
Another problem is not to lose the young generations. There is a risk of losing them because many young people who are not subject to conscription - from 17 to 24 years old - are now abroad. We must attract them so as not to lose them.
Imagine being a young person during the war. Some of them left the country out of fear or left the occupied territories. But there are also people who lived in more or less safe parts of Ukraine and used the war as an opportunity to go abroad, to get a Western education and to find work in the West with the intention of staying. The question is how to attract them back: what can we offer? We must first take care of the people who have remained here in this difficult period, not lose them.
Another challenge is to maintain liberal democracy. It is a question of mass psychology and institutions: we must maintain a system of checks and balances and constitutional rights. In my opinion, the correct model is the American one.
Speaking about the reconstruction of Ukraine, what is being done in practice? Are the plans already being implemented?
At the moment, we have a kind of "patronage system", where certain countries are responsible for the reconstruction of a certain city in Ukraine. Estonia, for example, is responsible for the reconstruction of Zhytomyr Oblast in Western Ukraine; the United Kingdom is responsible for Kiev and the surrounding areas. It is a good idea when a specific country becomes responsible for the economic development of a specific area, because foreign countries compete with each other and sometimes tend to show off.
As a good example, a few years ago we went with a delegation from Denmark to Mykolaiv and saw that Denmark was actively involved in small and medium-sized projects. These were water purification, hospitals, school buses and so on. This is what we mean by the reconstruction of Ukraine and we have resources to do it: $300 billion of frozen assets in the United States could be a good start. Now we are spending money on armaments to survive, but we have a hierarchy of priorities: first of all, survive; second, liberate our territories and demine them; then, rebuild our country economically starting with critical infrastructure (for example, the electricity system).
To make Ukraine an attractive country to live in, I believe we also need “enlightenment”: first-class Western-style universities, for example - and I have developed my own approach to this. Leading universities from the EU and the US could establish branches of these universities in Ukraine, for example on the condition that a young person enters the university for free, but after graduation stays here for 7 years. In this way, we will create a system of first-class universities and conditions that are attractive for people who want to stay in Ukraine.
* When the United Kingdom was part of the European Union, the EU consisted of 28 member states. After Brexit, which formally took place on 31 January 2020, the Union returned to 27.
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