European Union’s meet at Brussells may not lead to any final solution
By Ashok Nilakantan Ayers
NEW YORK: Nearly four years since Russia’s February 2022 full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Russia still occupies roughly 20 percent of the country, and Russian President Vladimir Putin made clear Wednesday that he has no intention of compromising on his territorial demands despite President Donald Trump’s intensifying efforts to broker peace.
In a combative speech delivered at the annual meeting of the Russian Defense Ministry, Putin lashed out at Ukraine’s European allies and declared Russia would seize territory by force if necessary.
“We would prefer to do this, and eliminate the root causes of the conflict, through diplomacy,” Putin said. “If the opposing country and its foreign patrons refuse to engage in substantive discussions, Russia will achieve the liberation of its historical lands through military means.”
The remarks came as diplomatic efforts to end Europe’s bloodiest conflict since World War II reached a critical juncture. European Union leaders are meeting in Brussels this week to debate an unprecedented plan to use frozen Russian assets to finance Ukraine’s defense, while Russia continues to gain ground, capturing 215 square miles of Ukrainian territory in the past four weeks.
The path to peace has been marked by repeated failures, most notably Trump’s much-hyped Alaska summit with Putin in August. The meeting at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson in Anchorage was intended to achieve a rapid ceasefire, but after nearly three hours of talks, Putin and Trump did not announce a ceasefire or an agreement to end the war.
Zelenskyy was not invited to the talks, and had warned that decisions made in his absence would be meaningless. The Ukrainian president’s exclusion from negotiations became a persistent theme as Trump pursued a bilateral approach with Russia that alarmed European allies.
Following Alaska, Putin and his officials have repeatedly referred back to the “spirit and letter” of the August summit, treating the meeting as a diplomatic victory. Meanwhile, Trump celebrated it as “a great and very successful day,” though no concrete progress toward peace materialized.
Yuri Ushakov, an advisor to Vladimir Putin, summed up subsequent negotiations between the Russian President and U.S. Special Envoy Steve Witkoff by noting that “so far, no compromise version of a peace settlement has been found”. The failure stems from Putin’s consistent refusal to negotiate in good faith, continuing to demand maximalist territorial concessions from Ukraine while offering nothing in return.
The human cost of the conflict continues to mount at a staggering pace. Russia has sustained more than 790,000 killed or injured, according to an April 2025 estimate, while Ukraine has suffered 400,000 killed or injured. Fighting and air strikes have inflicted over 53,000 civilian casualties, while 3.7 million people are internally displaced, and 6.9 million have fled Ukraine.
At the current rate of its advance, Russia would not seize the entire Donbas region until August 2027, according to analysis by the Institute for the Study of War. Yet Putin appears content to trade thousands of Russian lives for incremental gains, gambling that Ukraine’s smaller population and dwindling Western support will eventually force Kyiv to capitulate.
The battlefield dynamics remain dire for Ukraine. Russian strikes since October have pushed Ukraine’s grid to the brink, with Kyiv residents facing up to 16 hours a day without power. Russia’s systematic campaign against Ukraine’s energy infrastructure represents a calculated strategy to break civilian morale as winter approaches.
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen underscored the urgency Wednesday, calling on the continent to take responsibility for its own security. “There is no more important act of European defense than supporting Ukraine’s defense,” von der Leyen said in a speech to the European Parliament. “The next few days will be a crucial step for securing this. It’s up to us to choose how we fund Ukraine’s fight.”
The war’s impact extends far beyond Ukraine’s borders, disrupting global supply chains and threatening food security for millions. In a country once known as the bread basket of Europe, the conflict’s disruption to grain exports wiped $859 million off the value of Ukraine’s economy.
The war has caused massive disruptions in Ukraine’s grain exports, with Black Sea ports becoming largely inaccessible due to the ongoing conflict, causing dramatic price spikes and worsened food insecurity worldwide. Before the war, Ukrainian farmers earned around $270 per ton of grain. Now their earnings have dropped to only $100 per ton—below production costs—while U.S. and EU farmers have experienced record profits.
The disruptions have cascaded through multiple sectors. The review identifies five major impact domains: food security disruptions, energy market volatility, critical material shortages, transportation bottlenecks, and financial market responses. Energy prices surged dramatically in the war’s early months, with natural gas prices rising by 120-130% and coal prices by 95-97% in the first six months after the conflict began.
Sri Lanka experienced a dual blow through disruption of its $142 million tea exports to Russia and the loss of $4–7 billion annual foreign currency from Russian and Ukrainian tourists, demonstrating how even distant nations face economic consequences. Many African countries, which rely on Ukraine and Russia for more than half their grain consumption, now confront acute food shortages with limited ability to secure alternative sources.
Russia itself has not escaped economic damage. Russia’s GDP declined by 2.1% in 2022 and 0.2% in 2023, with oil and gas revenues decreasing by 17% due to Western sanctions. Over 200,000 educated and skilled workers have left Russia, creating significant gaps in the IT sector and knowledge-intensive industries.
The EU now faces a defining choice: whether to use approximately 210 billion euros in frozen Russian assets to support Ukraine. The European Union on Friday indefinitely froze Russia’s assets in Europe to ensure that Hungary and Slovakia, both with Moscow-friendly governments, can’t prevent the billions of euros from being used to support Ukraine.
The European Commission has proposed a “reparations loan” that Ukraine would only need to repay if and when Russia pays war reparations. But the plan faces significant opposition. Belgium, which holds most of the frozen assets through the Euroclear depository, has expressed deep concerns about potential Russian lawsuits. Italy, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, and Malta have joined Belgium in calling for alternative solutions.
Russia’s Central Bank announced Friday that it has filed a lawsuit in a Moscow commercial court against Euroclear, accusing one of Europe’s largest securities depositories of unlawfully preventing it from accessing its own frozen funds. Russian officials have warned of retaliation, with Security Council Deputy Chairman Dmitry Medvedev claiming the move could constitute justification for war.
Yet European leaders increasingly recognize they have little choice. With Trump having curtailed U.S. aid and signalling frustration with both sides, Europe faces the prospect of shouldering Ukraine’s defense largely alone. France has suggested security guarantees resembling NATO’s Article 5 mutual defense clause, though Washington’s commitment to such arrangements remains uncertain.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky warned Wednesday that Putin’s reference to “historical lands” portends danger for all of Europe. “There are other countries in Europe that someone in Russia may one day call their ‘historical lands,’” Zelensky said. “We need real protection from this Russian history of madness.”
Seventy-four percent of Ukrainians support negotiated peace along the front line as of mid-September 2025, backed by Western security guarantees, suggesting war fatigue even among those under daily assault. Yet any settlement that legitimizes Russian territorial gains would reward aggression and encourage future conflicts.
Putin made clear Wednesday that Russia remains “engaged in a dialogue with the US,” but dismissed the possibility of meaningful engagement with Europe under current leadership. “It is unlikely that this is possible with the current political elites, but in any case, it will be inevitable as we continue to strengthen,” Putin said, openly hoping for political change in European capitals more favourable to Russian interests.
As winter deepens and the war approaches its fourth year, the fundamental question remains unresolved: whether the international community will provide Ukraine with the resources to survive and ultimately prevail, or whether Putin’s bet on Western exhaustion will prove correct. The answer will shape not only Ukraine’s fate, but the future of the international order itself.
The Brussels summit this week may provide clarity on Europe’s commitment. But with Russia advancing daily, diplomatic failures mounting, and Trump’s engagement proving ineffective, the path to peace remains as elusive as ever.
What began as a swift invasion intended to topple Ukraine’s government has devolved into a grinding war of attrition with no end in sight—a conflict whose economic and human toll continues to ripple across the globe. (IPA Service)
