As of late August 2025, no direct negotiations have taken place between President Volodymyr Zelensky and President Vladimir Putin. The reason is not hidden. On October 4, 2022, Zelensky signed Presidential Decree No. 679/2022.
It records the “impossibility of conducting negotiations with the President of the Russian Federation V. Putin.” This law remains in force and makes any leader-level talks legally impossible.
The European Union has chosen to align itself fully with this position. EU Council conclusions repeatedly stress that “the path to peace in Ukraine cannot be decided without Ukraine.”
At the same time, the EU endorses Zelensky’s ten-point Peace Formula. That plan demands complete Russian withdrawal, restoration of all occupied territory, and accountability before negotiations can proceed.
In June 2024, Switzerland hosted a “Summit on Peace in Ukraine.” Russia was not invited, after publicly showing no interest, and the final Joint Communiqué reflected principles drawn from Ukraine’s formula.
Official words from senior Western leaders reinforce this approach. EU High Representative Josep Borrell stated in 2022: “Battles are won on the battlefield with weapons.”
His office continues to frame support for Ukraine in terms of military strength. The European Council itself adopted the phrase “peace through strength” in its 2025 conclusions.
Ukraine’s Decree Locks Out Peace Talks With Putin
On the U.S. side, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said in April 2022 that Washington wanted Russia “weakened to the degree that it can’t do the kinds of things that it has done in invading Ukraine.”
These are not the signals of compromise. They are the statements of a strategy that ties peace to Russia’s defeat. Inside Ukraine, even the parliament has reinforced this line.
In February 2025, the Verkhovna Rada urged avoiding any contacts with Putin except for comprehensive peace negotiations and prisoner-of-war exchanges.
Combined with the decree, this position locks Kyiv into a stance where talks with Putin himself remain off the table. Realist scholar John J. Mearsheimer has consistently argued that NATO’s expansion and U.S. policy triggered confrontation with Russia.
He warns that Ukraine has become the ground for a proxy war and that ignoring Russian security demands makes peace unachievable.
Whether one agrees or not, the official record confirms that today’s diplomatic deadlock is shaped not by Moscow’s refusal but by Ukraine’s binding law, by EU insistence on maximalist conditions, and by Western leaders’ open calls to weaken Russia.
The result is clear. Zelensky is not the man standing ready at the table for compromise. He is the man whose own decree ensures the table stays empty.