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IS THE WAR in Ukraine at the beginning of the end?
The prospect of a resolution to Russia’s war on Ukraine, which is approaching its third anniversary, has come into focus recently after US President Donald Trump said last week that he wants to see a stop put to it.
Russia has been attacking Ukraine since 24 February 2022, though Ukraine, backed by the EU and US, has put up an enduring defence and counter-offence operations.
European leaders are meeting in Paris today for high-level security talks.
Where does the war between Ukraine and Russia stand — and what positions have world leaders adopted about the next steps to take?
Russia’s military currently controls large portions of territory in eastern Ukraine in the regions of Luhansk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson.
This includes most of Donbas, an area of about 50,000 square kilometres where pro-Russian separatists had already secured a footing before the full-scale invasion in 2022.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has been clear that he wants to “liberate” Donbas. After Russia failed to capture Kyiv, Ukraine’s capital, in February 2022, it focused its efforts on eastern parts of the country, especially Donbas.
Russia has been pushing further and further west along parts of that frontline.
Ukraine in maps: Tracking the war with Russia https://t.co/nlFTgYi14G
— BBC News (World) (@BBCWorld) February 13, 2025
In November 2024, it seized 725 square kilometres – the most territory it has gained in a single month – followed by 476 square kilometres in December and 430 in January.
Ukrainian cities that are on the Russian side of the frontline include Bakhmut and Avdiivka.
At one key battleground, Russian forces have advanced about 40 kilometres west of Avdiivka over the last year towards the city of Pokrovsk, which is located along an important route that is used by Ukraine to transport supplies to its troops along the front.
Around 60,000 people lived in Pokrovsk before the 2022 invasion but many have fled from their homes.
Russia has been fighting to seize the city. On Saturday, it claimed to have captured the nearby village of Berezivka, which is close to a road that links Pokrovsk to another key town called Kostiantynivka. However, Ukrainian forces said yesterday that they have retaken the village.
The fight for control of Pokrovsk is ongoing.
At the same time, Ukraine is holding pockets of territory in Russia that its military has seized. In August, a surprise attack on Russia’s Kursk region advanced 30 kilometres east into Russia.
Two weeks into the operation, Ukraine claimed that it controlled over 1,200 sq km of Russian territory and more than 90 villages in the Kursk region. Russia has regained some of that territory since but Ukrainian troops remain in the region.
While on-the-ground troops battle for each inch of land, both countries are also exchanging air strikes.
They have especially targeted each other’s energy infrastructure.
Today, Ukrainian drones struck a pumping station on a pipeline that carries oil from Kazakhstan across southern Russia for exporting from the Black Sea, including to western Europe.
Meanwhile, Ukraine’s grid operator Ukrenergo announced emergency outages in some regions of Ukraine “due to the consequences of Russian attacks on energy facilities.”
Both Russia and Ukraine launched large drone attacks overnight that are characteristic of how the warfare has looked for many months.
Ukraine’s air force said it downed 83 out of 147 drones that Russia launched overnight, adding another 59 were “lost” without causing damage.
Russia’s defence ministry said it “intercepted and destroyed” 90 Ukrainian drones, including 24 over the southern region of Krasnodar, which is where the pipeline that was targeted is located.
Last week, Trump announced that he and Putin agreed on a phone call that “immediate” talks should start about ending the war in Ukraine.
However, although Ukraine ultimately wants to see an end to the war, it is very wary of how the US is steering the issue.
The Trump administration’s position is that Ukraine’s wishes to join Nato and to restore its borders to what they looked like before 2014 – that is, before the 2022 invasion and also before Russia’s 2014 annexation of Crimea – are “unrealistic”.
US and Russian diplomats are expected to meet in Saudi Arabia today for talks – but Ukraine was not invited to the meeting.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Ukraine “did not know anything about” the talks in Riyadh and that it “cannot recognise any things or any agreements about us without us”.
Zelenskyy is due to travel to Saudi Arabia on Wednesday for a “long-planned” visit but said he does not plan to hold talks with either the US or Russian officials, according to his spokesperson.
He said last week he is prepared to meet Putin but only after Ukraine and its allies develop a common position on how to end the war – which the US has not waited for.
In Europe, the US’s shift in policy and attitude towards Russia has caused alarm, especially after US Vice President JD Vance indicated that the US believes Europe needs to take more responsibility for its own defence.
Now, leaders of some European countries are at a meeting in Paris today for an emergency summit on Ukraine.
The meeting is addressing “the situation in Ukraine” and “security in Europe”, the French presidency said.
“Because of the acceleration of the Ukrainian issue, and as a result of what US leaders are saying, there is a need for Europeans to do more, better and in a coherent way, for our collective security,” an adviser to Macron said.
The question of whether European countries will send troops to Ukraine is especially prominent.
Macron, who is hosting the talks, has long mooted the idea of a European peacekeeping force in Ukraine.
UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer has now also said that he is prepared to deploy British troops to Ukraine if needed.
“Any role in helping to guarantee Ukraine’s security is helping to guarantee the security of our continent, and the security of this country,” Starmer wrote in the Daily Telegraph late yesterday.
Sweden has also indicated it would be willing to send troops.
Germany, however, has said it is too soon to consider such a measure.
“We have repeatedly stated that, first of all, we have to wait and see whether and how peace will hopefully emerge for Ukraine,” said German deputy government spokeswoman Christiane Hoffmann.
“Then we will be able to talk about the conditions and how this can be implemented,” she told reporters in Berlin, adding it was “premature” to discuss sending troops “at the present time”.
A government source in Berlin said Germany rejects sending troops to Ukraine for a potential future peacekeeping mission if it is “without full US involvement” and that it “will not participate in scenarios in which European and American security [policy] diverges”.
Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk has also ruled out sending Polish troops to Ukraine but added that it will continue to provide financial and military aid.
Additional reporting by AFP
Want to know more about what’s happening in Ukraine and why? Check out our FactCheck Knowledge Bank for essential reads and guides to finding good information online.
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