Zelensky on the risks of giving up Ukrainian territory

President Volodymyr Zelensky said that if Ukraine accepts a bad territorial decision, all issues will be resolved without Ukraine. Russia continues to try to seize Ukrainian territories.

Volodymyr Zelensky said this during a conversation with journalists on October 19.

Will Ukraine give up its territories?

Zelensky said that the Russians' position has not changed — they still want Ukraine to withdraw completely from the Donetsk and Luhansk regions. He said that Trump's representative, Witkoff, appealed to the referendum.

"These signals from the Russians are so far from reality that ten years passed between the start of the occupation and the so-called "referendum"… Mr. Whitcoff says it has been incorporated into the (Russian — ed.) constitution. So I explained to Mr. Witkoff again that if tomorrow Putin decides to add something else, after the war ends, will we again have to leave some territory? And if I, for example, amend Ukraine’s constitution to include two Russian regions, will they leave those territories? This is a model that doesn’t work," the president explained.

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