Members of a Ukrainian battalion load a shell into a self-propelled howitzer as they fire towards Russian troops in the Donetsk region of Ukraine on Friday.Stringer/Reuters
Ukrainian and Russian negotiators met in Abu Dhabi on Friday to tackle the vital issue of territory, with no sign of a compromise, as Russian air strikes plunged Ukraine into its worst energy crisis of the nearly four-year war.
Kyiv is under mounting U.S. pressure to reach a peace deal in the war triggered by Russia’s full-scale invasion in February, 2022, with Moscow demanding Kyiv cede its entire eastern industrial area of Donbas before it stops fighting.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said the territorial dispute was a central issue for the tripartite talks, including Russian, Ukrainian and U.S. officials, which were scheduled to conclude on Saturday.
“The most important thing is that Russia should be ready to end this war, which it started,” Zelensky said in a statement on the Telegram app, adding he was in regular contact with the Ukrainian negotiators, but it was too early to draw conclusions from Friday’s talks.
“We’ll see how the conversation goes tomorrow and what the outcome will be.”
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Rustem Umerov, the secretary of Ukraine’s National Security and Defence Council and the head of its delegation, said in a statement the talks had discussed parameters for ending the war and the “further logic of the negotiation process.”
The negotiations come a day after Zelensky met with U.S. President Donald Trump at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.
Zelensky said on Friday that a deal on U.S. security guarantees for Ukraine was ready, and that he was only waiting on Trump for a specific date and place to sign it.
Ukraine has sought robust security guarantees from Western allies in the event of a peace deal to prevent Russia, which has shown little interest in ending the war, from invading again.
A resident stands near tents of a government-run humanitarian aid point on Jan.20, during a power blackout after critical civil infrastructure was hit by overnight Russian missile and drone strikes.Anatolii Stepanov/Reuters
The tripartite talks, brokered by the U.S., are unfolding against a backdrop of intensified Russian strikes on Ukraine’s energy system that have cut power and heating to major cities such as Kyiv, as temperatures dip well below freezing.
The head of Ukraine’s top private power producer, Maxim Timchenko, told Reuters on Friday the situation was nearing a “humanitarian catastrophe” and that Ukraine needs a ceasefire that halts attacks on energy infrastructure.
Kyiv’s Energy Minister said on Thursday that Ukraine’s power grid had endured its most difficult day since a widespread blackout in November, 2022, when Russia began bombing energy infrastructure.
Russia says it wants a diplomatic solution but will keep working to achieve its goals by military means as long as a negotiated solution remains elusive.
Russian President Vladimir Putin’s demand that Ukraine surrender the 20 per cent it still holds of the Donetsk region of the Donbas – about 5,000 square kilometres – has proven a major stumbling block to a breakthrough deal.
Zelensky says issue of territory remains unsolved after talks with Trump
Zelensky refuses to give up land that Russia has not been able to capture in four years of grinding, attritional warfare. Polls show little appetite among Ukrainians for territorial concessions.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Friday that Russia’s insistence on Ukraine yielding all of Donbas was “a very important condition.”
A source close to the Kremlin told Reuters that Moscow considers an “Anchorage formula” – which Russia says was agreed between Trump and Putin at a summit in Alaska last August – would hand Russia control of all of Donbas and freeze the front lines elsewhere in Ukraine’s east and south.
Donetsk is one of four Ukrainian regions that Moscow said in 2022 it was annexing after referendums rejected by Kyiv and Western nations as bogus. Most countries recognize Donetsk as part of Ukraine.
A resident walks next to an apartment building hit by a Russian military strike in Kramatorsk, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Donetsk region, Ukraine January 22, 2026. REUTERS/Serhii KorovainyiSerhii Korovainyi/Reuters
Russia has also floated the idea of using the bulk of nearly US$5-billion of Russian assets frozen in the United States to fund a recovery of Russian-occupied territory inside Ukraine. Ukraine, backed by European allies, demands that Russia pay it reparations.
Asked about Russia’s idea, Zelensky dismissed it as “nonsense.”
Zelensky said on Thursday in Davos that the Abu Dhabi talks would be the first trilateral meetings involving Ukrainian and Russian envoys and U.S. mediators since the war began.
Last year, Russian and Ukrainian delegations had their first face-to-face meeting since 2022 when they met in Istanbul. A top Ukrainian military intelligence officer also had talks with U.S. and Russian delegations in Abu Dhabi in November.