NEW YORK, December 16. /TASS/. US President-elect Donald Trump will never meet Ukraine’s demand to provide it with US security guarantees, which it has been making recently instead of its previous demand to invite Kiev to NATO, The New York Times’s said in an op-ed.
According to the NYT author, Rajan Menon, Trump, "who seeks not only to end the war without making any promise to protect Ukraine, but also to reduce America’s security commitments in Europe in general, is unlikely to approve any such arrangement." In the end, Vladimir Zelensky’s hope to join NATO "will probably remain unfulfilled."
According to The New York Times, the US military will shift its priorities to the Asia Pacific Region in order to counter the growing influence of China under the Trump Administration. In this regard, it is "wise to anticipate a reduced American military role in Europe that will require Europeans to, at minimum, carry more of the burden for their defense, perhaps even the primary responsibility for protecting Ukraine."
On December 7, Trump met with Zelensky for the first time after the former’s victory in the US presidential election. According to Reuters, Zelensky insisted that the West provide security guarantees for Ukraine once the conflict is over, while Trump reiterated that he seeks to achieve an immediate ceasefire and peace talks.
The Ukrainian authorities have consistently stated that Kiev wishes to become a NATO member state in the near future. Zelensky suggested that the "hot phase" of the conflict could be halted if NATO embraces the Kiev-controlled regions of Ukraine under its "umbrella." Meanwhile, he admitted that Ukraine has not received any proposals in this regard. During the NATO Summit in Vilnius in 2023, the G7 countries expressed their intent to sign an agreement on security guarantees with Ukraine, which was supposed to "offset" the lack of an invitation to the alliance. Since then, Ukraine has signed over 15 bilateral agreements.
Previously, Russian President Vladimir Putin outlined the preconditions for the resolution of the conflict, which included the withdrawal of Ukrainian troops from Donbass and Novorossiya, opposition to Kiev’s accession to NATO, lifting of all Western anti-Russian sanctions, and the establishment of Ukraine’s non-aligned, non-nuclear status.