What reports Donbass Putin for Ukraine

A few days before the meeting with Vladimir Putin in Alaska Donald Trump, he referred to what he called “the Swop of Earth” as a condition of peace.

For the Ukrainians, it was an incomprehensible turn of the phrase. What land did you need to change? Was Ukraine propose a part of Russia in exchange for the land that Russia accepted by force?

Because Lodimir Zelensky is preparing for a trip to Washington on Monday to meet Trump is probably no “substitute” for the US president’s thinking.

Instead, he is reportedly planning to press Zelensky to hand over the entire eastern Ukrainian regions of Donetsk and Luhansk in return for frozen the rest of the front – Putin’s proposal in Alaska.

Luhansk is almost completely under Russian control. But, according to the estimates, Ukraine occupies about 30% of Donetsk, including several key cities and fortifications, the cost of tens of thousands of Ukrainian lives.

Both regions – together as Donbass – are rich in minerals and industry. It would be a “tragedy” in Russia now, said Ukrainian historian Jaroslav Gritsak.

“This is a Ukrainian territory,” Mr. Gritsak said. “The residents of these regions – especially the miners – played a big role in strengthening the Ukrainian identity.”

He also prepared “famous politicians, poets and dissidents,” he said. “And now refugees who will not be able to return home when it becomes Russian.”

At least 1.5 million Ukrainians have escaped from the Donben since the Russian aggression began in 2014. More than three million are estimated at the Russian occupation. It is estimated that another 300 thousand, where Ukraine still has control.

In the areas closest to the front line, life is already dangerous. In a telephone interview, Andrei Borila, a 55-year-old military chaplain in a severely affected city of Slavian, said that the sinks had landed near the house during the weekend.

“There is a very difficult situation here,” he said. “There is a sense of resignation and refusal. I don’t know how much we have the strength to endure. Someone has to protect us. But who?”

He said that Mr. Borila followed the news from Alaska. “I put it on Trump, not Zelensky. But they take everything from me, and that’s a betrayal.”

Zelensky consistently said that Ukraine would not hand over Dondas in exchange for peace. And the confidence in Russia to fulfill any such agreement – not just to use the attached land for future attacks – small.

For this reason, about 75% of Ukrainians object to any official cessation of land to Russia, according to a poll of the International Institute of Sociology of Kiev.

But Ukraine is also deeply tired of the war. Ever since the full -scale invasion began, hundreds of thousands of soldiers and civilians have been killed and injured. People crave suffering, especially in Donbass.

“You ask about the surrender of the Donetsk region, well, I measure this war not in kilometers, but in human life,” said 56 -year -old Ieen Tkachev, an emergency worker in the city of Donetsk.

“I am not ready to give tens of thousands of lives for several thousand square kilometers,” he said. “Life is more important than the territory.”

For some, this eventually comes down to this. Earth against life. He leaves the President Zelensky “at the crossroads without a good way to him,” said Voldmir Aryev, a Ukrainian MP from the European Solidarity Party.

“We lack the strength to continue the war on unlimited time,” Aryev said. “But if Zelensky acknowledged this land, it would not only be the failure of our constitution, it can have distinctive features of betrayal.”

Nevertheless, it is unclear in Ukraine what mechanisms can reach such an agreement. Any official transfer of the country’s territory requires the approval of the parliament and the referendum.

Most likely, there will be a defect transfer of control, without official recognition of the territory as Russian. But even in this case, the process is not well studied, said Ukrainian MP Ina Sousun.

“There is no real understanding of the procedure,” she said. “Is the president signed an agreement? Should it be a government? Parliament? There is no legal procedure, because, you know, the writers of the Constitution did not think about it.”

Things can become clearer after Zelensky talks to Trump in Washington on Monday – the first visit of the Ukrainian leader to the White House since the catastrophic collision in the oval office in February. Among the misfortune left by Alaska summit was one possible flash of good news for Ukraine.

Trump seemed to change his security guarantee after the summit, believing that he was ready to join Europe, offering Ukraine’s military defense from future Russian attacks.

For Ukrainians, surveys show that security guarantees are an absolutely important part of any potential agreement on the territory or anything else.

“People in Ukraine will accept various forms of security guarantees,” said Anton Hrushetsky, director of the International Institute of Sociology of Kiev, “but they require them.”

For Eugene Tkakhov, an ambulance officer in the shop, the exchange of the territory can only be considered “real guarantees, not just written promises”.

“Only then, more, I advocate the Donbass of Russia,” he said. “If the British Royal Fleet is located in the port of Odessa, then I agree.”

Because different ways to peace float and discussed, sometimes in a transaction style, preferred President Trump, there is a risk of losing because of real people who have already experienced a decade of war and who may lose even more in return for peace.

Donbass was a place full of Ukrainians from different sections of society, said Vitali Dribni, a Ukrainian historian. “We are not just talking about culture, politics, demographics, we are talking about people,” he said.

Donetsk may not have a cultural reputation somewhere like Odessa, Mr. Drinitia said. But it was Ukraine. “And any corner of Ukraine, regardless of whether is of great cultural importance or not, it is Ukraine,” he said.