Negotiators in Florida emerge with few details of talks to end war in Ukraine

Stakes ‘quite high’ for Ukraine today: Canadian global affairs expert

A Ukrainian delegation will meet with U.S. officials for the latest round of negotiations over plans to end the war with Russia. Andrew Rasiulis, a fellow with the Canadian Global Affairs Institute, says this meeting is ‘one of the last opportunities’ for a diplomatic solution to the Russia-Ukraine war.

Today’s meeting may be one of Ukraine’s last opportunities for a negotiated settlement to the end of the war, said Andrew Rasiulis, a fellow at the Canadian Global Affairs Institute and a retired Department of National Defence official.

The stakes are “quite high,” Rasiulis said in an interview on CBC News Network this morning.

Time is running out before the war concludes through military force, he explained, noting Russia has the advantage on the battlefield so Ukraine is negotiating from the weaker position.

“All these proposals that we’re seeing, they do in some way favour the Russians. That is a reflection of the battlefield reality,” Rasiulis said.

The biggest sticking point, he says, will be the remainder of the Donbas, especially the fortified area around Donetsk. A possible compromise could be a demilitarized zone rather than outright legal concession of territory, Rasiulis said.

He said Witkoff may actually be better positioned than anyone else to broker a deal because he is the only figure speaking to both Zelenskyy and Russian President Vladimir Putin.

“The Americans are now virtually neutral in this. They’re listening to the Russians, they’re listening to the Ukrainians,” Rasiulis said.