The Kremlin said on Monday that Moscow welcomed statements from US officials that ruled out Ukrainian entry into NATO.
“We have heard statements made at various levels in Washington that Ukraine’s NATO membership is ruled out. This is something that brings us satisfaction and aligns with our stance,” said Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov, according to TASS.
Several high-level Trump administration officials, including President Trump himself, have said that any peace deal to end the war in Ukraine would not involve Ukrainian membership in NATO.
Russia sought a guarantee from the US that Ukraine wouldn’t join NATO before it launched its invasion in February 2022, but the Biden administration refused to engage with Moscow on the issue. During short-lived peace talks in March and April of 2022, which were discouraged by the US, Russia’s main demand was for Ukrainian neutrality.
Bloomberg has reported that the US has presented a potential peace proposal for the war in Ukraine that would involve ruling out Ukrainian entry into NATO and easing sanctions on Russia. The report said the possible deal would effectively freeze the war, with Russia keeping the territory it currently controls, but other details are unclear.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Friday said that the US would decide in the coming days if a peace deal was possible in Ukraine. “We’re not going to continue with this endeavor for weeks and months on end. So we need to determine very quickly now, and I’m talking about a matter of days, whether or not this is doable in the next few weeks,” he said.
President Trump also said the US would “take a pass” on negotiating an end to the war if a deal isn’t reached soon. “Now, if for some reason one of the two parties makes it very difficult, we’re just going to say: ‘You’re foolish. You’re fools. You’re horrible people’ – and we’re going to just take a pass,” he said. “But hopefully we won’t have to do that.”
In the meantime, the fighting in Ukraine continues. Russian President Vladimir Putin declared a 30-hour Easter truce, although both sides accused the other of violations, and Russia announced it resumed attacks on Monday.
