The two-day talks in Abu Dhabi this week between US, Russian and Ukrainian officials produced a prisoner-exchange agreement in principle – but left the core issues unresolved. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has made clear that Kyiv will not accept territorial “concessions” in the Donbass as the price of a settlement.

Reports describe an American formula under which Russia would gain control over portions of the region without Ukraine necessarily abandoning every city it still holds, paired with security guarantees potentially comparable to NATO’s Article 5 and a wider security deal involving Europe.

Ukrainian sources have dismissed any formal plan to alter Donbass borders and reiterated long-standing red lines.

The dispute is not just about what comes first, but what each side will accept. In other words, it is both about whether territorial questions must be settled before or alongside credible postwar guarantees; and whether Europe joins the table for a wider security architecture. US envoys ask Moscow to accept an expanded format while Russia has resisted European participation. Thus far the diplomatic momentum remains limited.

One may recall that a somewhat similar American initiative surfaced a year earlier. In November 2025 the US advanced a 28-point framework that proposed limited........

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