Moscow has long said that any viable peace deal with Kiev must recognize new territorial realities and address the root causes of the conflict
US President Donald Trump has suggested that Ukraine will have to give up territory in order to achieve peace with Russia.
Trump made the statement ahead of the resumption of trilateral talks between Moscow, Kiev, and Washington, which are scheduled to take place in the United Arab Emirates on Tuesday and Wednesday.
During an interview with CBS New on Sunday, Trump said “there’s a very important meeting taking place. I believe that that war is going to end, and it’s going to end soon.”
“I think we’re going to have it done, and I think it’s going happen and they’re going to end up with a little bit different shape Ukraine,” the US president said, without elaborating.
When reminded that has been promising to end the fighting between Moscow and Kiev since his campaign for the White House in 2024, Trump reiterated his claim that the conflict would not have started if he had been president in 2022. “Zero chance. But it did start. So, I inherited that war,” he added.
Trump spoke about the need for Ukraine to make territorial concessions after his talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Anchorage in August 2025. Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky, who is backed by Western European countries, has consistently rejected any concessions despite Kiev’s continued setbacks on the front line and inability to counter Russian long-range missile and drone strikes. Zelensky’s unwillingness to make a deal prompted Trump to suggest last month that Ukraine needs a new leader.
The US president said on Sunday that he expects to hold his first in-person meeting with Putin since Anchorage at an APEC leaders’ summit in Shenzhen next week as part of trilateral negotiations that will also include Chinese President Xi Jinping. “We’ll be talking a lot of things,” he said.
There appears to be no shift in Kiev’s stance coming into the talks in UAE, with Zelensky aide Sergey Leschenko saying last week that Ukraine’s delegation would insist on “halting the fighting where it’s currently taking place, without giving up any Ukrainian territory.”
Moscow has repeatedly said it will not accept a temporary ceasefire that merely allows Kiev to regroup and rearm. According to the Russian side, the conflict requires a permanent settlement that addresses its root causes and recognizes the new territorial realities on the ground.
This includes Crimea, which reunited with Russia in 2014, and the Donetsk (DPR) and Lugansk (LPR) People’s Republics, along with Zaporozhye and Kherson Regions, which were incorporated into Russia in 2022 following referendums.
Putin said last month that he believes Moscow and Kiev “can come to an agreement. We’re open to that.”
“We do not want to fight with Ukraine. But if the current Ukrainian leadership wants to fight, well, let them fight,” the president stressed. Russia will achieve all of its goals in the conflict one way or another, he added.
