The United States and Russia begin negotiations on the war in Ukraine without the participation of Kiev or Europe
- Putin's demands and Trump's interests in Ukraine
- Riyadh reiterates that any agreement with Israel will be conditional on the creation of a Palestinian state
The President of the United States, Donald Trump, is redefining the traditional approach to tackling major international conflicts. On the one hand, he is proposing negotiations - excluding Kiev - to end the war in Ukraine through possible concessions to Russia; on the other, he is proposing the relocation of the population of Gaza to neighbouring countries to gain control of the Palestinian enclave.
Both wars, key issues during the election campaign, are at the top of the agenda for the Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, during his trip to the Middle East. After visiting Israel, Rubio is now in Saudi Arabia, where he has met with his Saudi counterpart, Faisal bin Farhan, and with the Crown Prince, Mohamed bin Salman.
However, the highlight of Rubio's trip to Riyadh was his meeting with the Russian Foreign Minister, Sergei Lavrov. In the Saudi capital, Washington and Moscow began their first high-level meeting in more than three years with the aim of normalising bilateral relations and laying the foundations for negotiations to end the war in Ukraine.
This is the first ‘face-to-face’ meeting between a Russian foreign minister and a US secretary of state since the meeting between Lavrov and Antony Blinken in January 2022, a month before the start of the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
This meeting, a few days before the third anniversary of the start of the war in Ukraine, is also intended to prepare a summit in Riyadh between President Trump and his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin.
The US delegation is made up of Rubio, Washington's special envoy to the Middle East, Steve Witkoff, and the White House National Security Advisor, Mike Waltz, while Lavrov is accompanied by Yuri Ushakov, the Kremlin's advisor for International Affairs.
Before the start of the meeting, Kiril Dmitriev, a member of the Russian delegation, told the state media that Moscow ‘expects a debate and a positive dialogue’. In addition to the war in Ukraine, Dmitriev believes that ‘finding joint economic pathways and positive solutions to problems is extremely important, especially for the United States and for many other countries that are beginning to realise that the Russian market is extremely attractive and that it is necessary to have a presence there’.
On the other hand, Lavrov said before travelling to Riyadh that he ‘saw no reason for the Europeans to participate’ in the negotiations on Ukraine, accusing them of wanting to ‘continue the war’. The European powers, excluded from the talks between Russia and the United States, met earlier in Paris in order to agree on a common response to ensure the stability of Europe.
Both the continent's leaders and the Ukrainian government have expressed their rejection of the negotiations on the war because they did not involve them. In fact, the Ukrainian president, Volodimir Zelensky, assured that Kiev ‘will not recognise any agreement’ reached without its participation.
In this sense, the Ukrainian leader also urged Europeans to ‘act’ to avoid an agreement ‘behind the back’ of Ukraine and Europe, and proposed creating an ‘armed force for Europe’.
However, Rubio said before his meeting with Lavrov that the process towards peace ‘is not a question of one meeting’, assuring that when the ‘real negotiations’ begin, Ukraine should ‘be involved’. The Kremlin also stated a few days ago that, if talks on the future of Ukraine were to take place, Kiev would participate ‘in one way or another’.
Putin's demands and Trump's interests in Ukraine
In order to end the war, Moscow is demanding that Ukraine cede four regions in the east and south of its territory, as well as the Crimean peninsula, annexed by Russia in 2014, and that it renounce its aspiration to join NATO, conditions that Kiev has categorically rejected on several occasions.
Putin also wants Washington to commit to no former Soviet Union country joining NATO. On this point, Moscow is also calling for the military alliance to withdraw its troops and weaponry from the states that joined after May 1997, which includes the Baltic countries, Poland - bordering Russia - Romania and Bulgaria.
For its part, the United States is looking at Ukraine's natural resources with particular interest. Ukraine is estimated to have the largest reserves of titanium in Europe, a key material for the aerospace, medical and automotive industries. It also has the largest European reserves of lithium, essential for the manufacture of batteries, ceramics and glass.
Trump has proposed that Ukraine provide the United States with $500 billion worth of rare earth metals in payment for Washington's military aid during the war years. However, Zelensky has rejected this plan and is trying to reach a better agreement.
Riyadh reiterates that any agreement with Israel will be conditional on the creation of a Palestinian state
In addition to the war in Ukraine, Rubio's trip to Saudi Arabia also served to address the day after Gaza following the war and the release of the Israeli hostages still in the hands of Hamas.
The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, one of Washington's main allies in the Middle East, has expressed its outright rejection of Trump's plan for Gaza, making any normalisation agreement with Israel conditional on the creation of a sovereign Palestinian state in Gaza and the West Bank.
During his first term in office, Trump promoted efforts to establish diplomatic ties between Saudi Arabia and Israel. Joe Biden's administration continued these efforts, although the war in Gaza has made this normalisation difficult. In fact, one of the main reasons why Hamas launched the attack on 7 October 2023, which marked the beginning of the conflict, was to thwart any possible peace agreement between Jerusalem and Riyadh.