 Good morning and good afternoon. My name is John Herbst, the Director of the Eurasia Center at the Atlantic Council. We have a wonderful event for you today on Ukraine's foreign policy, which will be kicked off by the Foreign Minister of Ukraine, Mr. Kuleba. And we are doing this event in conjunction with the US Institute of Peace and with Chatham House. And the resulance savings of Chatham House will be our moderator, and she will introduce our guests. Thank you. Over to you, Eurasia. Thank you, John. Good day to all of us, to all of you joining us from different corners of the world. I am managing Ukraine Forum at Chatham House. And paradoxically, this pandemic, on one hand, put us all in the isolation, but on the other, as if the walls collapsed. And we all feel in a way much closer right now. Definitely, I feel the walls of Chatham House collapsed. We're all working from home. So today, we have an excellent panel put together by the Atlantic Council on the Prospects for the Resolution of Conflict in Donbas. And it has been more than six years that this conflict is simmering in the center of Europe in a way it lasts longer than the Second World War, when you think about it. And Russia wages a full spectrum warfare against Ukraine, regardless of Western pressure, regardless of Ukraine's own effort to keep the enemy at bay. President Zelensky came to power last year with a very strong promise to end the war. He has revived the Normandy meeting, and we had several meetings of the context looping means. But the question is, what have we achieved so far? What is Ukraine's strategic position? What Ukraine is trying to achieve? And today with us, we have an excellent panel, and we will kick off with the introductory remarks from the new Foreign Minister, Kuleba, who is quite young as a minister, with less than one month in office, but he has been part of the diplomatic course from 2003. He has served as the Ukraine Permanent Representative to the Council of Europe from 2016. He has also been the Deputy Prime Minister for European and Euro-Atlantic Integration. He is also of a very interesting book called The War for Reality, How to Win in the World of Fakes, Truths and Communities. Other participants, I would like to introduce all of you at this point briefly, includes William Taylor, Ambassador to Ukraine from 2006 and 2009, but most recently in 2019, he served as Charjet de Ferre at the US Embassy in Ukraine. It was a bit of a time travel, but these were interesting times, and I believe it's the first kind of public appearance of Ambassador Taylor after a very famous testimony he gave in the impeachment hearings. We do have Slava Vakarchuk, who needs little introduction in Ukraine, but now globally he is becoming the voice of reformer. He's a member of parliament and founder of Wallace Party. He was very active both in Orange Revolution and in Euromaidan. He is a rock singer activist politician that really has a vision how to change Ukraine. We also have with us today Ambassador John Herbst, who is a very experienced career diplomat with almost 31 years experience in the diplomatic service, also an ambassador to Ukraine. He was there before William Taylor, 2003, 2006. And last but not least, Adrian Karatnitsky, who is a watcher of Ukraine. He is frequently in key. He is former president of Freedom House. Currently he is the senior fellow at the Atlantic Council's Eurasia Center. He keeps his hand on Ukraine's pulse and he understands really well both domestic and foreign policy. So I would like to start with Minister Kuleba explaining us what's new in Ukraine's negotiating position, what remains the same and how Ukraine plans to achieve peace in Donbass. Over to you, Foreign Minister. Wow, that's the question sounds ambitious. First of all, thank you for having me with you today or this still morning, I guess, in the United States. It's an honor to have this discussion with former ambassadors to Ukraine, with Svetoslav, who is one of the political leaders in Ukraine and with distinguished experts. Honestly speaking, I do not observe major changes in our policy towards Russia and nor do I observe any major changes in Russian policy towards Ukraine. I think we are still discussing the same issues as we used to discuss since 2014. I think that the main narratives are still in place. Russia insists now that it is not a party to the conflict with the same level of vigor and assertiveness as it did so in 2014. Russia calls on Ukraine to engage in direct dialogue with so-called Lugansk and Donetsk People's Republics as it has been doing since 2014. So these things are still there. And on our side, we do not engage in direct dialogue with the entities I mentioned. We insist that trilateral contact group is deliberately called trilateral because it consists of Ukraine, Russia and OEC. And of course, we consider Russia as party to the conflict and not as a mediator or facilitator or in any other capacity. However, at the same time, we engage with Russia on such issues as release of prisoners or exchange of prisoners, whatever term we may use here. And on this engagement along the front line and if we manage to build trust between two parties, Russia and Ukraine. In these spheres, we can move further and try to unlock other issues which are on the agenda. So that's where we seem to stand at the moment. There are many emotions, many concerns. Negotiating with Russia is like walking a minefield. You never know where it will blow up. So reactions and counter reactions from all corners can be easily understood. But the main lines of our policy and our approach to settling this conflict remains absolutely unchanged. Did you ask anything more? No, if you're okay, if you don't have any other kind of introductory remarks that you would like to make, I would like to follow up a little bit with the question. You've mentioned that the narratives and the policies remain the same and Russia's strategic objectives towards Ukraine remain the same. So how can Ukrainian diplomacy, Ukrainian foreign service work towards nudging Russia's position? Because we all know Ukrainians would like to have and believe that the only way to have peace in Ukraine, it has to be a negotiated outcome. In this world that is now affected by pandemic, the way Russia is trying to use the pandemic to both undermine Ukraine from inside, but also put a question on sanctions as a humanitarian issue. Do you find it more complicated to maintain solidarity of Western allies on this front or support to Ukraine and solidarity with Ukraine remains unchanged also on Western front? Well, when it comes to solidarity, this situation is always the same. It doesn't matter how strong the solidarity you enjoy, you always want more. And I think this is part of political reality for any country. What makes me confident that we can still count on solidarity is actually the sequence of recent events in the European Union and in the United Nations, where a number of countries let the effort to prevent Russia from adopting the declaration initiated by it with a noble title to like a solidarity of nations to combat COVID-19, but with a very specific paragraph in the text calling for easing sanctions or lifting them on so-called humanitarian grounds. So, you know, you test solidarity and friendship and partnership in action, and that was a good test. And we registered the support coming from the United States, the strong position voiced by the European Union, by High Representative Borrell, clearly saying that sanctions imposed in response to violation of human rights and international law have nothing to do with humanitarian grounds. So this was a good test for the solidarity. And as far as I can conclude from the events of last week, the solidarity is there. Everything else is a matter of diplomacy, negotiations, finding striking balances, and engaging active, relative actors in the game. Thank you for answering that. And I would like to push you a little bit more on this consultative council, because it was a protocol signed during the trilateral group in Minsk. It caused quite a lot of anxiety internally in Ukraine. So I wanted to ask you, what is the added value of having such a body and how can it contribute to conflict resolution? The opponents of this would argue that it's kind of playing to exactly those Russian narratives and pushing Ukraine to recognize, legitimize, quasi-authorities, Russian, basically proxy groups. And did you hear any feedback from Ukraine's partners in the Normandy format on this consultative council? Because they also, according to this protocol, are supposed to delegate their representatives. Thank you. In my one month in office as Foreign Minister, I have been pushed a little bit further on the issue of consultative council so many times that, you know, it almost causes no reaction in me when you push me again. This issue has received a lot of attention. The idea of consultative council came to life in less than a week since my appointment, so I was not standing at the kind of origins of this idea, of this initiative. I had to face it as a reality. I think there are two points which have to be taken into account. First, as I said, Ukraine will insist on the current structure of the trilateral content group. And this content, this trilateral content group consists of three actors, Russia, Ukraine, OECD. Everything else is a matter for internal structuring, but we will not, inside, within the content group. But we are not looking, we are not seeking direct dialogue with Donetsk and Lugansk. But we have to engage and talk with them to implement on only a specific set of issues to implement certain points of the Minsk agreement. The idea of the consultative council is that we do not engage with representatives of so-called Donetsk and Lugansk People's Republic, but we make our societies talk and engage with each other. Point two that I want to raise is to mention is that whatever any kind of change happening on Minsk track is taking with anxiety. Because as I mentioned earlier in one of my responses, the level of trust is running to zero. People do not trust. Public opinion has no trust in what's happening on that track. So any change or any attempt to moderate process in a slightly different way is taking with anxiety. And I understand our public opinion that was looking for more explanations and for more arguments on why this body is needed. And I equally understand our partners who approached me in particular with questions asking for more details about this initiative and seeking more explanations on the kind of sense of the logic of this development. Again, our goal is very simple. We have to be creative and we have to look for solutions which do not allow freezing the process taking place within Minsk format. We cannot put the situation on hold. If we allow that, we will lose time. And it will be extremely difficult to recharge batteries after they are dead. So we have to look for solutions. And this is the commitment that was declared by President Zelensky that he wants to end the war and he is ready to make steps forward. But these steps will not lead to crossing Ukraine's red lines. And that's also something that should be taken for granted. Thank you. I have a couple of questions that are coming through the Q&A chat. I will, unfortunately, only take those that are related to Donbass because I see some questions related to why the foreign policy priorities. Unfortunately, this is not the topic of our discussion. But one of the questions that came related to the process, the Normandy and Minsk process, is could you please speak about potential prisoner swap scheduled for this weekend? Do you have any update or any fresh information that you could share? The most difficult part is to talk about prisoner's exchange because the last thing I want to do is to put it at risk by any unnecessary comment or promise given publicly. The agreement on the exchange was reached yesterday. We aim at welcoming our people back before Easter, before Orthodox Easter to make it. So it's next week. We know what are the numbers from both sides. But I will not disclose them at this point simply because we have to be very cautious since we talk about destinies, feelings and emotions of people. But for us, the release of people and of persons and exchanges are top priority. Because any war is first and foremost about human destinies and about lives and sufferings of our compatriots. So this will remain an absolute focus for the government to work on the release of prisoners. Thank you, minister. Our audiences are coming back to more details on this consultative council. And Ali Crowley is asking, will Russia have any role other than observer on the consultative council? Well, first I have to tell you that the issue of consultative council has not been discussed in the trilateral contact group since early March, I think 11th of March when it had been discussed for the first time. So for the time being the only thing that we have related to the consultative council, the only three things which we have related to the consultative council are first the paper, the working paper with the description of the council of 11th of March, a very heated discussion of the consultative council in the Ukrainian society and discussions and exchange of views on consultative council with our partners. Nothing has changed with regard to this initiative since the beginning of March and what is written in the paper that has become that became available to the public. And no one knows what will be the final version of the consultative council if any in the end after all the rounds of negotiations. Well, I understand that both our international partners and Ukrainian society will be closely watching how this process evolves. I think you still have about 10 minutes with us from what I was informed. I would like to open actually to a panel to Slavovo, Karchuk and Adrian to ask questions to you, minister. Maybe we'll start with Slavo. Can you hear me? Yes, we can hear you well. First of all, once again, I'm very happy to be here. I hope I'll have opportunity to talk later. But I have just a very simple question and I would like Mr. Ambassador to give me a simple answer. What is your personal attitude to the initiatives of the consultative council? Do you support it or do you disagree with it? As a person, as a diplomat, as a Ukrainian citizen? Thank you. Thank you, Slavo. Since you referred to Ambassador, I think you have to specify which of ambassadors are you asking? No, okay. It was not a joke. I just mean that you have an experience to be a diplomat and ambassador and so you understand you are more than just a politician, although today you are a political appointee. But I ask you a direct question and I want, if you can, give me a direct answer. Your personal opinion. Never expect direct answers from diplomats. I think that's kind of a rule of our profession. But the answer is very simple. I will never agree as a minister to a direct dialogue between Ukrainian officials and so-called Donetsk and Lugansk representatives. Everything else is the field or the space for the art of diplomacy. But there are certain red lines which I will not cross as foreign minister or a citizen of Ukraine. And this is one of them. Thank you, Adrian. Over to you. Yes. So there was a lot of controversy about this dialogue process with the Org-Law attendant to the discussions and papers that were signed on March 11th. But the most controversial was that the documents were signed by representatives of the Org-Law in a protocol where they were referred to as plenipotentiary representatives of the Org-Law of the special regions of Donetsk and Lugansk. To my understanding, and if you can confirm it, was this the first time in any diplomatic relationship that Ukraine affixed its agreement to such terminology? And secondly, is it the position of Ukraine to start using this terminology in the future for those participants as advisors to the Russian side? And third, if it is not, will you, can you confirm that Ukraine will not sign any further documents or protocols in which these gentlemen are referred to as the plenipotentiary representatives? For me, as diplomats, we can only speak about plenipotentiary ambassadors. That's the issue. On the issue of who and in which capacity we'll be signing documents, I think we have to wait and to see which documents and how we'll be signed if any at all can be arranged so within trilateral content group. What I can easily share with you right now is that two meetings of trilateral content group have already taken place in the format of video conference. And in this, in all cases, we never signed anything and the exchange of communication between participants of these meetings is taking place in accordance with the practice established in previous years, which means that we do not communicate with each other. We send our communications to the technical support unit of the means group and we see coordinates further communication. So, if I may remain a diplomat and provide you with this answer, then I will appreciate if you accept it. Well, we'll have to accept it at this point and I will use the last four or five minutes that we have for a question from David Kramer, another experienced diplomat and an expert on Ukraine. In a way, it comes in a circle from where we started. We do know that the keys to peace in Ukraine are in the Kremlin, lie in the Kremlin to a large extent. So, David is asking, do you see any indication to suggest that Putin is interested in resolving the war, withdrawing his forces from Ukrainian territory and respecting Ukraine's sovereignty and territorial integrity, especially in light of the pandemic situation? I think that I believe that President Putin has no other choice but to withdraw from Ukraine, from Eastern Ukraine and from Crimea as well. Everything else is just a matter of time. Well, thank you very much for being with us and understand that you have some other duties to go to. We will be continuing with the panel. It will be recorded so you can watch the rest of our conversation later on and we hope you do. I will move now to our next speaker. I would like to ask Ambassador Taylor, who has worked a lot in Ukraine and especially closely with President Zelensky during his time in Kiev. From your point of view, from the art of possible, how do you assess the strategy of Zelensky in dealing with Russia? And do you see any deviation from that course that you've seen in Ukraine or over the last year and during President Poroshenko if you could compare a little bit? Do you see anything changes with this consultative council? Is there any worry that you have that perhaps Ukraine is falling into Putin's trap? Thank you. I appreciate your question. I appreciate being here. I'm glad that the NTVs can co-sponsor this discussion. Yeah. I had the opportunity last year to both see the President in his campaign as well as in his first days in office as well as when he put together the government and through the fall. And I will say that the goal remained the same. The goal was clear. That was to end the war on Ukrainian terms protecting the sovereignty of the nation within internationally recognized borders. That goal was stated clearly during the campaign and was adhered during the time that I observed. In answer to your question, it does seem to me that the President and his team which is as we know changed. There are a couple of changes over the months. Did change. The tactics changed. The goal was the same, but it seemed to me that they were willing to try things. They were willing to experiment. And these experimentation some worked and some didn't work. We're aware of the flirtation with the Steinmeier formula. Not such a great idea and several of us had conversations with the President about that. Disengagement. Some of the disengagement worked in some sense. Where that was able to be repaired and people could move across that bridge more easily. Old people, young people were able to move that. That was important. We've talked already about the prisoner releases. The prisoner releases was a big deal. I remember the Saturday that the first batch of prisoners came back and the sailors. It was a spontaneous national holiday. So that experiment that work seemed to pay off. There have been other kinds of experiments that focused on humanitarian or people to people or the ability of Ukrainians to live and prosper and suffer less. And I'm thinking of some of the changes made at the border crossings. I visited several of them myself with the previous foreign minister and with the previous national security advisor who I will say were very interested as was the president, they told me in the well-being of people on both sides of the line. Both sides of the border crossings. Looking for ways to make those border crossings easier. I mentioned the bridge but down in the border crossing with the temporary border crossing from Kherson into Crimea the requirement that people had to walk for a kilometer and a half in the heat this was during the summer was real concern to this administration. So looking for ways to make lives of Ukrainians better in this seems to be a change, a focus. You mentioned the consultant of council. I would just say that one experiment that seems to me that they have been trying and this is an example of that is talking to people on the other side. I think the foreign minister just mentioned about talking to the representatives of the puppets of the LNR and DNR no one should be talking to them. They're non-entities but there are Ukrainians living in Orlo and there are Ukrainians sooner or later we hope will be reintegrated into Ukraine and so conversations with these people seem to me to make some sense and that's the experiment that they can usefully play. I think there have been some changes in tactics and some experiments some have worked and some haven't but I look forward to seeing more of those. Are you there? Yeah, you're still there John. How are you? Good. We seem to have lost contact with our moderator so I will ask the next question. Slava you're the leader of the opposition party which has been cooperating with on this development in the negotiations, most welcome. First of all I think that the most important promise of the president was to end the war but many people in the country, in Ukraine understood differently and that was probably the biggest problem or campaign of President Zelensky because he told so many things that could be broadly treated by different analysts or generally by the constituency so when you say I want to end the war there is a question okay but on whose conditions so our party is very strongly committed to the thing that the only piece that Ukraine can achieve and need to achieve the piece by Ukraine means because sometimes you can achieve peace by the enemy's means and on their condition and that can be actually that can lead to the end of your country per se so for us it's absolutely unacceptable crossing these so called red lines and I'm very happy that Minister Koleba mentioned that red lines but once again you need to define these red lines and not just talking about red lines as about big definition but to say what does it mean one of these red lines is suddenly that Ukraine the war in east of Ukraine is not an internal conflict of Ukraine it takes a war imposed orchestrated and actually being made by Russia and it is a war of Russia against Ukraine and we treat it very very straight forward so this is red line we cannot cross and what war is me and war is a lot of other people and actually it's not only about the world or our supporters or members of the party but a lot of analysts we talked with a lot of people from civil society all of them became very anxious and suspected this so called conservative council that it's gonna undermine this kind of the idea that Ukraine is talking with our enemy with the help of our two allies that are let's say our partners and help us to make this talk which is a normal format and actually this idea that we have so called conservative council it really undermines and I'd say also dilutes the whole idea of this for country talking directly with each other and I understand the point of many other people that they say that people from different parts of Ukraine from our controlled by a prime party and from so called parties they need to talk they may talk and they still talk they have relatives they have some they go to see their relatives our checkpoints are working so they can be you know using their private possibilities to see each other and to have this dialogue and they are doing it but political dialogue between Ukraine and primary puppets are unacceptable because that only will make peace less achievable not more achievable because the more we bring the more the more we put on the table initiatives that divide Ukraine and society the more difficult path to a real peace we can see and in our opinion the only strategy that we can use now is to make Russia stop shooting this is very clear very simple not very simply to achieve but a very simple point to stop shooting first and actually we have our plan we call it the cold the occupation and I think that most of you know about this plan the first and the most important point of this plan is stop shooting and stop shooting not for week or two and not only on the points of engagement but generally for half a year or even more and then we can see that both sides are ready to stop the war and only afterwards we can go further and we can talk about political points we cannot talk about politics before we solve all defense issues and this is one the other problem of this so called Consolidate Council because they once again entangle political and defensive issues which in our opinion is a very dangerous thing to do and we cannot one cannot be very naive and not to be understand that Minsk agreements the Poroshenko's team signed literally on the barrel of a gun five years ago were designed by Russia the way that all defense and security and political issues were entangled with each other the way that every next step of Ukraine inside will weaken our position and will make our sovereignty less robust and less stable so our task today instead of creating some initiatives that can divide Ukrainian society is to come up with a plan which is actually supported by the whole Ukrainian society and this is the number one number one thing that we support that we need to stop killing of our soldiers and our citizens and this is the very simple thing it's easier to say than to do but that is in my opinion what the president and his team including Mr. Kolev should be doing persuading our partners in nomadic format France and Germany and our partners in Budapest format including suddenly the United States we all need to push Russia to stop fighting and this is the only strategy that in our opinion can work and can bring to some tangible results all other things including trying to find with all my respect Ambassador Taylor how much I respect and even love you but with all my respect all these other formats I think they only make things more complicated just we need to put it simple very simple because all true things all truth is simple the truth is that Russia makes this war happen and they can stop it to push one button and stop Thank you Slava I am back with you sorry I was for a minute disconnected I hope you can hear me well now but there is a question also in the chat from Jonathan Bronson who is asking well will the rather next vote on provisional special status which it has extended that expired at the end of 2018 are there any discussions is there any cross-party discussion inside the parliament on what are the modalities of the special status and how it will fit or not fit with the decentralization constitutional change Thank you very much so the whole position of the whole party is very clear we voted strongly against this law and we will vote against any special status further we think it's very dangerous to create some the idea of special status of Donbas because it is a threat to Ukrainian sovereignty and independence even if it's if it has a temporary thing it's much our point is very simple if you already have a temporary law it's much easier to change it to a permanent one than to create a new one if there is none existing and we think it's very dangerous to play with all these special statuses Ukraine my constitution is a unitary country not a federal country in our political system we are already now to accept this country as a whole territory where we have one constitution one set of laws and what the rules are the same for everybody so sadly there should be some special attitude understanding that we actually have war and there is part of the country that we don't control so we need to make a roadmap and this roadmap actually we work on it we talk with other parties let me emphasize on a very simple thing before there is a long lasting ceasefire there should not be any serious political negotiations not only because they are I'm like bad for Ukraine and for Ukraine and future but also because they make things even more complicated let's first solve the problem of a ceasefire once it is solved we can go further so this is our proposal and we will stand on it very firmly thank you for answering that so I would like to now move to Adrian and ask him from his experience of seeing Ukraine with many different administration running the country at the start of Zelensky's presidency there were a lot of questions about his qualification his team was able to negotiate with Putin and there were a lot of concerns about whether he could be making some mistakes right now we have a new head of president's office Andriy Yermak who is in charge clearly especially working with Kozak in the trilateral group how do you assess they are handling this process are they making some mistakes or they are doing everything to defend Ukraine's national interest I think that president Zelensky is the monument of the sense of the Ukrainian people which was a sense of hope a sense of expectations none of them grounded in the very difficult realities unrealistic expectations about how quickly you can change the court system and clean up corruption unrealistic expectations that it is only a personal will to build a relationship with the president of Russia that will open the door to peace in the east and I think he has received a kind of an education over the course of the year but I think that one of the weaknesses of his current style of operating is that the core group of people on whom he relies are still very narrowly based he's not reached out to embrace in his core inner circle people who've had a long period of expertise either in foreign affairs or in even domestic policy these are mainly people from the entertainment industry or entertainment lawyers and so on they may be smart people and they may have certain capacity to grow on the job but in the absence of those kinds of trusted seasoned advisors every president has had them people like Volodymyr Harbouyan or others to whom you can turn to get a deeper insight into geopolitics or domestic affairs that is sadly lacking what is interesting is also that there was a kind of a scattershot approach in the selection of the people who made up the 254 vote majority in the rada from the servant of the people party but we've seen over the course of the last few months the coalescing of people who got into that list on the basis of liberal pro-European policies and also patriotic policies and asserting a kind of an independence so while it is now possible to say that there is no longer this super majority there are situational majorities inside the rada and I think that the emergence of this group of young people many of them western educated many of them active in anti-corruption civil society efforts that made it into the servant group they're the ones who were among the 65 or so who signed the initial document opposing the concessions made on March 11th and I think that that is another very healthy and if the president embraces these people as constructive partners rather than sees them as somehow disloyal I think he will improve his performance and enrich the performance of the administration Thanks Adrian there's a question here in the Q&A section that in view of president Zelensky's desire to reintegrate Donbass and he even speaks of safely reintegrating Donbass because you know probably Kremlin's idea is to just shuffle Donbass back to make it destabilize Ukraine even further but in that view I mean Bill Hamilton is asking the war has consolidated and strengthened pro-western Ukrainian national identity is there a room for residents of the occupied territories in such a definition of Ukrainian identity You're asking me Yes I think there is room because Ukraine is a democracy and Ukraine would vote on various approaches to language to culture to civilization I don't think you can make compromises on behalf of the opinion of the public Yes minority rights have to be respected but Ukraine as has been stated by Slava Bakrochuk is a unitary state it has made that kind of a choice I would add that Russia primarily is a unitary state except for the autonomy and it tolerates no reaching of that kind of a standard and what is the reality of Ukraine Ukraine when different factions and different administrations have been in power there has never been persecution of the people in the East I think what is needed is a communications campaign to make the people of the Donbass remember that they were basically left alone and allowed to handle their own affairs they had in effect decentralization perhaps too much decentralization in the past but there has never been the case that the Ukrainian centralized government has ever come and tried to impose a national identity etc. I think what we are dealing with is how to undo Russian propaganda and pro-Russian propaganda that has been persistent over the course of six years and has made some inroads and I think that is what the president is trying to do so in my view there is no compromise to be made Ukraine is the idea of reintegrating Donbass is not to put a part of Russia inside Ukraine it is to put a specific part of Ukraine back into Ukraine but operating under the general rules that are adjudicated in the democratic process through the Rada, through elections and through the wisdom of its elected leaders Thank you for answering this one so now we will move to Ambassador Herbst of course Ukraine cannot withstand Russian aggression on its own but on the other hand Russia cannot win against the United West and these are the two pieces of the same problem that is important to keep in focus United States has always been a strong ally Ukraine in this struggle against Russia with the impeachment hearings with Trump's presidency with Zelensky is in office right now after all of this turmoil would you say why partisan support for Ukraine hold and what is the impact of right now having no US special representative for Ukraine we do know that Kult Volker spent quite a lot of time shuffling between the different European capitals keeping everybody on the same page consolidating positions how would you assess the current role of the United States in helping resolve this conflict? First it's important to recognize the questions surrounding impeachment proceedings here bipartisan support for Ukraine in Congress remains rock solid it's worth pointing out that even as the impeachment hearings were underway Congress agreed to restore or rather to maintain military assistance to Ukraine and even authorize increased to $50 million military assistance and during the impeachment proceedings Congress voted punishing sanctions which have severely delayed if not destroyed nor streams do and I spent a lot of time consulting with staff in Congress I can tell you Republicans and Democrats are firm in supporting Ukraine Kurt Volker performed a terrific service as a special envoy he made clear to the whole world something that everyone watching this event knows which is that the war in Donbass is a war of Kremlin aggression against Ukraine it's not any kind of civil war inside Ukraine so from that standpoint Kurt's departure is a loss but foreign policy of the United States even under President Trump remains strongly supportive of Ukraine and pushing back against Kremlin aggression in Ukraine Pompeo is excellent on this as is Esperanto Department of Defense as is O'Brien at the NSC and lower levels of state with George Kent as the desk Philip Rieker as the acting assistant secretary and Steve Began as the new deputy secretary of state understand this issue really well and they recognize that America has important interests in making sure that Kremlin aggression in Donbass is defeated so I don't have any doubt that even with Kurt's departure Ukraine is getting quality attention from Pompeo, from Esper and their teams at the Defense Department and the State Department Thank you John there's a question here from Michael Hrytsak about is there any chance that the trilateral contact group will eventually add another state representative or state representative such as United States or other states providing military aid to Ukraine there's been a lot of ideas floated in the way how means could be or should be expanded countries that were co-signatories of the Budapest memorandum do we have all the tools to negotiate a deal and it's just because Russia does not want to make any change in its position or do we need to think about new diplomatic platforms, some revisions of the existing ones the Minsk process prior to President Zelensky negotiating first the prison release last summer and then President Zelensky having a successful summit in Paris produced nothing for Ukraine the only serious talks on ending Kremlin aggression in Donbas have taken place between first Tori Nuland and Serkhov and then between Kurt Volcker and Serkhov so while I think it would be nice if the U.S. participated in the Minsk process I don't think it's essential and I think that when the U.S. engages, Russia pays attention and offers quality ideas unfortunately those quality ideas have not led to quality proposals and quality policies on the part of Mr. Putin getting out of Ukraine but I agree with Foreign Minister Kuliba that Russia will eventually leave Donbas and not in the very distant future we're not talking about decades we're talking about months or years and eventually they will get out of Crimea let me take decades and here's one more question to Ambassador Herz is there a talk of appointing a new U.S. envoy on Ukraine I would not rule it out but I do not expect it and again Volcker did a great job you have very smart people paying attention to Ukraine and the State Departments who are performing Volcker's functions without those jobs so Riecker and Kent and for that matter David Hale the Undersecretary of State have been in touch with the French and the German representatives so that we are coordinating and others in the department may take over this function thank you I'll take another question and direct it to Ambassador Taylor from Beir Assuming that Ukraine's negotiating position has not changed and considering the key if not dominant role of Russia in this peace process what would compel Russia to leave Ukraine I agree with Ambassador Herz that the Russians will leave Donbas in the nearer future and they'll be inclined to that I believe they are inclined to that for a couple of reasons one is this is a loser for them this does not bring them benefits their role soldiers in Donbas this does not bring them benefits it only brought them pain and costs the costs are in the form of sanctions the sanctions hurt the sanctions a percent of GDP a year this is serious pain that they are enjoying now they have the problem of the virus which they have to deal with and that's going to bring on the economic problems that are exacerbated by the sanctions so they are looking at big problems and they'll look for a way out thank you I would like to bring in Slava with the following question there's in some experts countries like Ukraine or Moldova called in between states and the question is whether it would be acceptable for a country like Ukraine that some people see as in between states between Russia and the European Union to embrace the neutrality status and to continue economic, social and cultural integration towards the West without for example NATO membership would that de-escalate the conflict would that be acceptable for Russia and what would you say as Ukrainian to such proposition first of all thank you for this question first of all I think there is no pattern than Ukraine can use because every example in the world's history is unique there are our neighbors of a former solid block like Poland or Baltic countries that were very successful in the quick path to all European institutions including NATO and European Union there was a question there was a famous example which some experts now bring on the table the Finland's example we all know how difficult was Finland's history especially the relationship with Russia and the former Soviet Union starting with the war in 1940 especially starting with being a colony of Russian Empire then a war of 1940-1941 and then they ended up first winning then formally losing the war and losing a big part of territory and becoming a neutral country but staying an independent nation and managing to build a big prosperous society I think Ukraine example is unique we are not in a position of Poland or Baltic countries today we actually we could have used this path I think I strongly believe we could have used this path in 90s and the beginning of 2000s but the politicians former politicians were much more in Ukraine much more preoccupied with filling their pockets with dollars than with bringing Ukraine closer to west not only in words but in their deeds and it's actually something that I think it was a wasted time to some extent today I don't think we had a privilege of Poland or Baltic countries in the 90s but still I think our path is a closed integration with all European institutions and especially defense umbrella which NATO is I totally understand I'm not a naive person I don't think that Rome wasn't built in a day and you cannot do this in one day but I still think that this is a roadmap or at least a start for us compass that we need to use both because this is the only alternative for Ukraine to stand against very strong and unfortunately aggressive neighbor that we have next to us but also because as we see from the 90s that the integration and the roadmap of then generally the process of integration into both NATO and EU gives a lot of benefit to the nation and that's why I think that first what Ukraine needs to do now is first strongly claim our North Atlantic and European let's say our our desire to follow this path second not waiting for kind of guarantees or something but just doing our job and making our army stronger making the standards of our army closer to NATO building a strong and independent and not corrupt court system making this country where there is a rule of law bringing foreign investment all these kind of things all our home tasks we need to do it whatever they say we need to do it and I think the more we succeed the more we our efforts are resultative the easier for us will be to persuade our partners that it's a worthwhile worthwhile game for them to bring Ukraine closer and to make it a member of this both respected and very important clubs which EU and NATO are their security kind of club security umbrella is even more important for Ukraine to do and in this and in this particular case having here two wonderful people who were ambassadors of Ukraine and represented United States I want to stay here in this company that the thing the role of the United States may be very important in this particular in this in this scenario and I think that it is a great important that United States continue to have a strong have a strong say both in regulation of conflict of war in Donbas and also generally in making Ukraine in positions of say more successful now Thank you Slava and Adrian would like to add he noted me on this question go ahead Adrian I think there's a fundamental difference between say what happened with Finland and its pursuit of neutrality Russia or the Soviet Union had territorial pretensions on Finland but Mr Putin has ethno-national pretensions on Ukraine he is interested in saying that the people of Ukraine are actually the Russian people and so potentially subject to both his sphere of influence and his sphere of dominance and potentially of participants in a unitary state and so when we discuss the prospects for peace what we really have to deal with is the reality that Mr Putin does not want the existence of either the Ukrainian people or the Ukrainian state and what we need to do is to find the types of mechanisms that will constrain him until over time different leaders find different solutions in Russia I couldn't agree more couldn't agree more Good we have agreement here and also there's a shifting public opinion inside Ukraine for how it sees its security and support for NATO membership has increased dramatically since Russian aggression on Ukraine and that's important because why Ukraine is also not Russia is public opinion matters and Slava knows that as a Ukrainian politician you have to listen to Ukrainian citizens and act upon very important change in public opinion that happens especially around NATO I have a question I will take a few more questions No, sorry to interrupt you but you know that the majority of Ukrainians support the idea that Ukraine can join NATO now it's probably the first time in 30 years of our history Exactly So Tatyana Voroshko is asking I would like to direct you to John Herbst about are there any indicators that the US military and other assistance to Ukraine might be affected by COVID-19 pandemic and the stress it puts on the US economy is there any risk that it may decrease? The short answer to that is no Again I'm having four or five meetings a week with staffers from Congress and I can tell you again Republicans and Democrats are strongly interested even in the age of coronavirus in our policy towards Ukraine supporting Ukraine against criminal aggression and our policy towards Russia making sure Russia pays a price for its aggression in Ukraine and elsewhere In these very interesting times I can't rule out someone proposing to limit foreign assistance foreign military assistance but even if that conversation begins I don't think it will affect military assistance to Ukraine or economic assistance Ambassador Taylor this one is from the Denis Yassitian about can we expect tougher sanctions on Russia and in a way what may prompt tougher sanctions on Russia from the United States side If the Russians were to invade further If the Russians were to send more troops If the Russians were to violate the borders If the Russians were to send their proxies into other parts of Donbas That is if the Russians were to exacerbate the situation I think yes that it would be possible for the reasons that Ambassador Herp said there is strong support in our Congress for these kinds of sanctions and they have been the Congress has been very clear about this and that kind of aggressive behavior in part of the Russians would prompt more sanctions I believe and maybe we'll take this last question to all of the panelists because it's interesting to hear your views from Vasyl Babich who is asking UN peacekeeping mission in Donbas was proposed by Poroshenko's administration this proposal has not yet been picked up by Zelensky's administration do you think there's still a room to make the UN peacekeeping mission a reality what are crucial pros and cons of such mission maybe we'll start with Adrian and then go in that order well again I think all of these are path dependent and they're only a realistic if Mr. Putin is interested in coming to a deal I don't believe he is so I think that this is a non-starter Ambassador Taylor so I disagree with Adrian I think as I said earlier I think Mr. Putin does want to get out of Donbas and I think an international peacekeeping force not authorized by but not run by the security council is a real option Flava, is your party promoting the idea of the peacekeeping mission our party is promoting our plan which I will be ready to share with everybody who still haven't read it and certainly one of the items of this plan but not the first one is suddenly the possibility of bringing some peacekeeping mission should it be UN mission or OSCE mission but certainly there should be some intermediate mission with international mandate before Ukraine gets this territory back fully because you need this part so we support the idea that should be some international made it for that mission but first once again I will state it once again should be a long lasting ceasefire before that happens nothing else is ever possible yes there needs to be peace to be kept in the first place in a way I'm somewhere in between Bill and Adrian I believe that Mr. Putin does not see a need at the present time to leave Donbas but I believe there are thoughtful people in Russia who understands as Bill said that Moscow's excellent adventure in Ukraine has been a disaster for them it's hurt their economy it's hurt their international position and eventually they'll have to leave when that day comes the whole concept of an international peacekeeping mission may provide a cover for Mr. Putin to get out with a shred of dignity I'm happy to give him all the dignity he wants as long as he gets the out of Donbas and ends his war there can I see the raising hands of Slava please just one very important thing one of the other days recently Russian authorities I think was Putin himself who raised this question that today during the pandemic coronavirus everybody should put a current time quarantine on sanctions for other countries because it weakens their economy and that's not the time for sanctions absolutely unacceptable and I think and I hope and our partners in all countries including the United States understand that because Russia was the sanctions were imposed on Russia not because of pandemic or something like that it's because of their cruel violation of international order and so I think that connection or playing on feelings of countries who are hit hard by the coronavirus pandemic now is absolutely unacceptable is very cynical is very manipulative we need to strong we stand against it thank you very much I think we will be wrapping up our conversation today we still have quite a lot of questions but obviously it's normal we had almost 140 163 participants in joining us today in this conversation I think sometimes in politics and in life the most difficult is to do nothing in a way from this conversation what I understand is that Zelensky has to persevere in keeping the front lines of Ukraine defended is to maintaining this resilience of the country and keeping unity which is so important for Ukraine to overcoming this aggression there's still a lot to do for Ukraine's diplomacy and Ukraine ends up putting a lot of hopes to the foreign minister and his team obviously they are not favoring the military scenario regardless of this information and warmongering of Russia about Ukraine and I would like to thank everybody for joining today I cannot say join me in the round of applause but you can clap whenever you are to all the speakers I think it's been very informative perhaps this time I think the next round of applause would take a button from the Atlantic Council and continue this conversation on Vars we have something in the pipeline where we will share with everybody the information but thank you Atlantic Council for having such a star panel for all your insights wishing all the happy Easter who are celebrating this weekend and those who are celebrating next one thank you for joining us and have a nice evening and stay at home say lives I will not continue because the rest is very British thank you so much