Ukraine says it wants 'real peace, not appeasement' with Russia

VIENNA: Ukraine wants "real peace, not appeasement" with Russia, its foreign minister said on Thursday at the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, the security and rights body seeking a role for itself in a post-war Ukraine.

AI Brief

Ukraine calls for principled peace talks, warning against appeasement and unfair deals.
US says path to peace remains unclear while OSCE struggles with deadlock and reform disputes.
Russia accuses OSCE of bias as US threatens to cut funding and limit its functions.

The path ahead for peace talks is currently unclear, U.S. President Donald Trump said on Wednesday, after what he called "reasonably good" talks between Russian President Vladimir Putin and U.S. envoys.

"We still remember the names of those who betrayed future generations in Munich. This should never be repeated again. Principles must be untouchable, and we need real peace, not appeasement," Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha told the OSCE's annual Ministerial Council.

He was referring to a 1938 agreement with Nazi Germany in which Britain, France and Italy agreed to Hitler's annexation of the Sudetenland in what was then Czechoslovakia. The agreement is widely used as shorthand for failing to confront a threatening power.

"Europe had too many unfair peace deals in the past. All of them only led to new catastrophes," Sybiha said while thanking the United States for advancing peace efforts and pledging that Ukraine would "use every opportunity to try to end this war".

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Wednesday his team was preparing for meetings in the United States and that dialogue with Trump's representatives will continue.

The OSCE, a 57-nation body that includes the United States, Canada, Russia and much of Europe and Central Asia, emerged as an important forum for east-west dialogue during the Cold War.

In recent years, it has often been deadlocked as Russia has blocked important decisions, accusing it of having been taken over by the West. Russia complained in its statement of the "total Ukrainisation of the agenda" at the OSCE.

Now the United States is threatening to pull out while demanding reforms such as cutting the budget by more than 10% and that the body "revert to its core functions".

Delivering the U.S. statement, State Department Senior Bureau Official for European and Eurasian Affairs Brendan Hanrahan cited the OSCE's election monitoring, in which it calls out votes that are not free or fair, as an example of overreach.

"The OSCE must stop treating transformation of domestic political life as one of its core functions," he said in his statement, adding: "Monitoring, whether borders, elections or reforms, can only be effective with the full cooperation of the states involved."