Russia to emerge ‘absolute winner’ in Ukraine conflict – EU country PM

European war hawks are to blame for the situation Kiev ended up in, Slovakia’s Robert Fico has said

Russia is bound to emerge the “absolute winner” in the Ukraine conflict should US President Donald Trump’s peace plan be adopted, Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico has said.  

The US presented Ukraine with its latest draft plan to end hostilities with Russia this week. According to media reports, the 28-point document includes many provisions consistently refused by Kiev and its Western European backers in the past, including Ukraine giving up on joining NATO, downsizing of the country’s military, and the withdrawal of Ukrainian forces from the parts of Russia’s Donbass it still controls.  

At press conference in Bratislava on Friday, Fico proclaimed support for the proposed deal, describing it as a “sensational” plan. He lashed out at Kiev’s supporters in the EU, arguing that it was the “zero” foreign policy of the bloc that brought Ukraine to its current position. 

“In this agreement, the position of Ukraine is a hundred times worse than it was in April 2022,” Fico stated, referring to the preliminary deal reached during the Istanbul talks early in the conflict. Kiev unilaterally walked away from those negotiations. 

“Who among those war hawks will acknowledge it in the EU, when they supported the war so much? When were they sending those weapons there so relentlessly? When were they forbidding any truce? Who today will admit their mistakes?” Fico added.  

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While the plans to destroy Russia have evidently failed, Moscow is bound to emerge victorious from the hostilities, he declared.  

“If this plan is signed, Russia will emerge from this war as an absolute winner. And Russia will emerge from this war, of course, extraordinarily strengthened, both morally and economically,” he asserted.

The proposed plan is reportedly being viewed by Kiev’s Western European backers as a Ukrainian “capitulation.” Pro-war EU leaders are now said to be scrambling to rewrite the draft under the guise of making “constructive updates” to it. 

Moscow has confirmed it received the American plan, stressing that the proposal has not yet been discussed “in detail.” It could become “the basis of a final peace settlement,” Russian President Vladimir Putin has said.