August 17, 2025 - Ukraine war talks updates

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Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskyy speaks during a media conference at EU headquarters in Brussels, Belgium on Sunday.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky arrived in Washington DC late Sunday ahead of crucial talks with US President Donald Trump, saying he is confident of Ukraine obtaining security guarantees with the support of European leaders.

“I have already arrived in Washington, tomorrow I am meeting with President Trump. Tomorrow we are also speaking with European leaders. I am grateful to @POTUS for the invitation,” Zelensky wrote on X.

Zelensky will meet with Trump for bilateral talks in the Oval Office, before Trump meets with European leaders.

“We all share a strong desire to end this war quickly and reliably. And peace must be lasting,” Zelensky wrote.

Zelensky suggested new security guarantees would need to be stronger than those that “didn’t work” in the past, citing the loss of Crimea to Russia, which Moscow’s illegally annexed in 2014.

“Ukrainians are fighting for their land, for their independence,” he said, adding that he hoped the show of strength from the US and Europe would help “force Russia into a real peace.”

Earlier, President Trump suggested Ukraine would need to give up the idea of regaining Crimea or joining NATO as part of the peace talks.

US President Donald Trump meets with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky at the White House in Washington, D.C., on February 28, 2025.

On the eve of highly consequential talks with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and a large delegation of European leaders, President Donald Trump on Sunday previewed the message he’ll deliver to his White House visitors: Zelensky must agree to some of Russia’s conditions for the war in Ukraine to end.

The post underscored the pressure Zelensky will face Monday as Trump works to end the conflict. The two conditions he listed — that Ukraine cede Crimea, which Russia illegally annexed in 2014, and that it agree never to join NATO — are among the conditions Vladimir Putin has set for ending the war.

European leaders visiting the White House with Zelensky on Monday are concerned the meeting will amount to Trump pressuring the Ukrainian leader to accept the conditions Putin put forward in their Alaska summit last week.

They hope to glean more information from Trump on what Russia might concede as part of a peace deal, including what role the US would play in providing security guarantees going forward.

The European delegation: French President Emmanuel Macron, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, Finnish President Alexander Stubb, and NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte will join Zelensky for the visit.

Mikhail Ulyanov attends a IAEA Board of Governors meeting in Vienna on April 11, 2024.

Russia will need “efficient security guarantees” under a future peace agreement, Russia’s envoy to international organizations in Vienna said late Sunday.

Mikhail Ulyanov said on X that Russia agrees such assurances should be provided for Ukraine, but that Moscow also has “equal right to expect that.”

He claimed the West hasn’t started thinking about what it could offer, and that Russia would help in that regard during negotiations.

European leaders joined Volodymyr Zelensky for a conference call ahead of the Ukrainian leader’s meeting with US President Donald Trump at the White House on Monday.

CNN’s Ben Wedeman breaks down key developments from Sunday:

You can also watch this video on YouTube Shorts.

US President Donald Trump, right, greets Russian President Vladimir Putin at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson in Anchorage, Alaska, on Friday.

It was not the applause, or the red carpet, or the ride in the presidential limousine, or speaking first on the podium that were the biggest gifts offered up to Vladimir Putin at the Alaska summit. President Donald Trump’s greatest favor to his Russian counterpart was time.

Even as Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky heads to Washington on Monday with a phalanx of European leaders to hold hurried talks with Trump, the war grinds on.

Russian success or failure on the front line will be measured in a matter of weeks. Putin has until mid-October until the weather cools, ground softens, and advances become harder. That is a full two months. His forces are on the brink of turning painfully incremental and costly micro-advances in “nowhere” villages in eastern Ukraine into a more strategic gain.

Almost every day, another settlement falls.

Trump’s threat of sanctions penalizing countries that buy Russian oil and gas would not stop Putin’s war effort this year. But it has already clearly piled pressure on him, in the forms of calls from the leaders of India and China.

Putin does not want to maintain a lengthy war effort under economic pressure from his two main energy customers and effective sponsors, themselves having to endure tariff pain from the United States. And so, he is in a rush on the battlefield, but agonizingly slow at the negotiating table.

Read more here about the summit’s consequences.

Fierce fighting between Ukrainian and Russian forces has continued even as much of the world’s attention turns to the high-stakes diplomatic efforts by US President Donald Trump and European leaders.

These images provide a glimpse at the situation on the ground in Ukraine:

A resident carries belongings out of a damaged residential building following a Russian strike in the town of Bilozerske, Ukraine, on Tuesday. People in Bilozerske, in the eastern Donetsk region, are evacuating as Russian troops make gains in the area.

Ukrainian soldiers fire at Russian drones in Ukraine's Dnipropetrovsk region on August 10.

Friends and family members mourn over the body of Diana Koskyk before a funeral for her and her unborn baby, Damir, at her home in Kamianske, Ukraine, on July 31. Koskyk was killed in a missile strike that damaged a maternity hospital where she was receiving treatment.

The explosion of a drone lights up the sky over the city during a Russian attack on Kyiv on August 8.

Burned cars sit at the site of a Russian drone strike in the town of Druzhkivka, Ukraine, on August 2.

A 15-year-old boy was killed in a Russian attack on a village in the Zaporizhzhia region, Ukrainian officials said Sunday.

At least six people were wounded in the attack, including the teenager’s parents, younger brother and sister, Ukraine’s foreign ministry said, adding that several homes were damaged or destroyed.

More background: As US President Donald Trump shifts from pursuing a short-term ceasefire to focusing immediately on a wider peace deal, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has insisted Moscow must “stop the killing” before negotiations can progress.

Kyiv’s allies are ready to deploy a “reassurance force” to Ukraine once fighting has ceased, the British and French leaders said in a joint statement after co-chairing a virtual meeting today with President Volodymyr Zelensky and other allies.

Leaders of the “Coalition of the Willing” commended US President Donald Trump’s commitment to providing security guarantees to Ukraine, in which they pledged to play a “vital” role.

They also said they were ready to help secure Ukraine’s skies and seas, and strengthen the Ukrainian armed forces.

Thirty-three Ukrainian military personnel and 51 civilians were returned home by Russia on Thursday in an exchange facilitated by the United Arab Emirates.

CNN’s Rafael Romo spoke with the family of a POW who is finally reunited with loved ones:

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Ukrainian soldiers and civilians reunite with loved ones in prisoner exchange

02:55 • Source: CNN

Top row from left: Germany Chancellor Friedrich Merz, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, French President Emmanuel Macron and Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni. Bottom row from left: European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, Finland President Alexander Stubb, NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

We learned throughout the morning that more than half a dozen key European leaders will attend talks between Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky and US President Donald Trump in Washington, DC, tomorrow.

If you’re just catching up, here’s who will be in attendance:

Read next: US Secretary of State Marco Rubio dismisses the idea that Europeans are attending the talks to keep Zelensky from getting “bullied.”

This post has been updated to complete the list of attendees.

Tomorrow’s major gathering of European leaders at the White House will be broken into parts, according to people familiar with the planning.

United States President Donald Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky are expected to meet individually with their delegations first.

Then, they are expected to join a larger group session and potentially a lunch with the other European leaders coming to Washington, DC.

The topics expected to be discussed are Russia’s demands on land concessions and the contours of security guarantees for Ukraine — including how the US will be involved.

US envoy Steve Witkoff told CNN this morning that he believes US President Donald Trump is close to securing a three-way meeting between him and the presidents of Russia and Ukraine.

Watch his comments below, and read more takeaways from Witkoff’s interview here.

Ukrainian servicemen load ammunition into a howitzer before firing towards Russian positions at the frontline in Zaporizhzhia, Ukraine, on August 7.

Some residents in Ukraine’s capital are rejecting the idea that their country would have to give up territory as part of a peace agreement with Russia.

Anna Moshyna, 22, a theater student from Kyiv, visited the growing memorial for Ukraine’s war dead in the capital’s central square, Maidan.

Her father died three months ago on the front lines in Donetsk — one of the regions which Russian President Vladimir Putin wants Ukraine to give up in exchange for a peace deal.

Student Anna Moshyna, who recently lost her 50-year-old father to the fighting in eastern Ukraine.

“There are a lot of brave people, the best people of Ukraine, and they were fighting to keep it Ukrainian,” Moshyna said. “I don’t agree to give it to Putin.”

Some background: Zelensky met today with European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen in Brussels.

“The Constitution of Ukraine makes it impossible to give up territory or trade land,” Zelensky said in a news conference after the meeting. “Since the territorial issue is so important, it should be discussed only by the leaders of Ukraine and Russia and the trilateral Ukraine-United States-Russia.”

Former US Vice President Mike Pence said he knows President Donald Trump likes to use the “velvet glove” style in dealing with dictators, but he believes “the hammer needs to come and it needs to come immediately” following the president’s meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

In addition to his meeting with Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky tomorrow, Pence said Trump should call on Majority Leader John Thune to “immediately” pass another sanctions bill against Russia in the Senate.

Still, Pence commended Trump’s pursuit of a ceasefire despite “many voices in and around the administration that would have cut Ukraine loose months ago.”

More reaction to Trump’s meeting: Meanwhile, Democratic Sen. Chris Murphy harshly criticized the Trump-Putin summit, calling it “a great day for Russia.”

“Trump said, ‘If I don’t get a ceasefire, Putin is going to pay a price.’ And then he walked out of that meeting saying, ‘I didn’t get a ceasefire, I didn’t get a peace deal, and I’m not even considering sanctions,’” Murphy said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”

European leaders focused on security guarantees for Ukraine among other critical matters during discussions today in preparation for Monday’s meeting in Washington, a European Commission spokesperson said.

Leaders also discussed the need to “stop the killing” in Ukraine, maintaining pressure on Russia through sanctions, and the principle that Ukraine must make decisions on its own territory.

“This was also the occasion for the leaders to reaffirm once again their unity in supporting Ukraine towards a just and lasting peace,” the spokesperson said.

Read more here: A closer look at security guarantees and why they’re significant.

French President Emmanuel Macron speaks to media in Bormes-les-Mimosas, France, on Sunday.

French President Emmanuel Macron warned today that Europe must remain tough on Russia in order to avoid future conflicts, as European leaders gear up for Monday’s meeting with US President Donald Trump in Washington.

“We must enter into a new diplomatic phase … one in which we have to defend European interests,” Macron said following a virtual meeting of the “Coalition of the Willing,” a group of Ukraine’s main European allies.

More than a half-dozen leaders from the continent will attend the White House talks alongside Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

The French leader said Europe is ready to take responsibility regarding security guarantees in Ukraine and reiterated his stance that Kyiv cannot be forced to give up territory via third-party negotiations that exclude Ukraine.

“If we are weak with Russia today, we are preparing the conflicts of tomorrow,” he warned.

Anxiety is growing in the Ukrainian capital Kyiv ahead of a meeting in the White House aimed at ending the war with Russia.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky will meet with US President Donald Trump tomorrow, along with European leaders from the UK, Germany, France, Finland and Italy — plus the NATO chief and the European Commission president.

“We don’t know what (will) happen tomorrow,” Kyiv resident Iryna Krenets, 36, said. “We don’t trust (Russian President Vladimir Putin).”

Iryna Krenets, 36, with her 8-year-old daughter Eva.

“We understand that our president (will) show our strong position about our territory, about our country. We want to live in our free country, our whole country,” she added.

Krenets said Ukraine would never hand over their land to the “terrorist” who invaded them.

“I don’t believe in this peace,” she said.

Key background: Putin made concessions on his demand for Ukrainian “land swaps” during his summit with US President Donald Trump in Alaska on Friday, Trump’s envoy Steve Witkoff told CNN today. He declined to offer specifics, but suggested the Kremlin now sees “land swapping” occurring at the current front lines, rather than the administrative boundaries of at least some of the five regions long in Putin’s sights.

Russia has not commented on making such a concession.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky speaks during a media conference in Brussels, Belgium, on Sunday.

We’ve been reporting on the significance of potential European and US security guarantees for Ukraine in the case of a peace deal.

That’s been top of mind today for Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, as well, who said in a post on Telegram that he needs specific details on what the guarantees would entail and how they’d be provided — particularly in light of the Trump administration saying Russia was willing to allow US participation as part of a deal.

The Ukrainian leader said he considers membership in the European Union to be part of the guarantees.

“We have heard from President Trump that America and (Russian President Vladimir) Putin see it the same way,” he added.

Russia illegally annexed four regions of Ukraine in 2023: Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson.

Luhansk is the only one it almost wholly occupies. It has failed to take the key fortress belt of cities in Donetsk.

Neither President Vladimir Putin nor any figure in the Russian government has suggested a retreat from Moscow’s maximalist demand that all four regions must be ceded to its control.

But as we’ve been reporting, US President Donald Trump’s top envoy told CNN this morning that Putin made some concessions on the “land swaps” he’s seeking.

According to Witkoff, Putin said at Friday’s summit in Alaska that he’s willing to adjust his demands regarding five regions. He did not name the fifth, but it is likely Crimea, which Russia annexed in 2014.

Again, we haven’t heard that from Russian officials, so far.

Here’s what Putin has said: After the meeting, the Russian leader said it was necessary “to consider all legitimate concerns of Russia and to reinstate a just balance of security in Europe.”

At the Kremlin a day later, Putin said he and Trump “had an opportunity to discuss the origins and causes of this crisis,” adding: “It is the removal of these root causes that must underlie the settlement.”

“We would like to move forward with settling all issues by peaceful means,” Putin asserted Saturday.

But only when those root causes are addressed.