Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has outlined three steps he intends to take to prepare for a peace plan that could be ready before the end of the year to enable a second international peace summit to be held , with the possibility of the participation of officials from Russia.
Speaking at a press conference on July 15, after his trip to the United States, where he attended the NATO summit, Zelensky said that the meeting, which will most likely be held in Qatar, at the end this month, or in early August, aims to get some answers, and then prepare the energy security plan.
Then, at the end of August, a second meeting is planned to be held in Turkey, to agree on the food security plan, and a third meeting in September, in Canada, in order to create a plan for the exchange of prisoners and return of children taken from Ukraine to Russia.
“I set this goal for us, to have the plan ready in November. When the plan is ready, everything will be ready for the second summit,” Zelensky said.
At the first peace summit, held July 15-16 in Switzerland, more than 90 countries focused on Europe’s most destructive conflict since World War II.
After the distribution of the delegations, the parties have agreed on keeping the process alive, and on the possibility of organizing a second summit in the future.
However, the fact that Moscow has not been invited to that organization – which it itself has considered a waste of time – has increased the dilemmas about the outcome of the peace processes.
Although the final communique of the summit did not specifically mention Russia, it was said that “achieving peace requires engaging in dialogue between all parties”.
“I believe that the representatives of Russia should be at the second summit”, Zelensky said at the press conference.
Moscow has not yet commented on this statement.
