US floats Donbas swap for Ukraine’s path to NATO

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said the United States raised for the first time the option of Kyiv withdrawing its troops from Donbas in exchange for a path to NATO membership. The idea emerged in US-mediated Ukraine-Russia peace talks after discussions in Abu Dhabi. According to Zelensky, the question posed by US negotiators was whether Ukraine would be willing to pull back from Donbas if it were accepted into the alliance. He said there was no final proposal yet, and Ukraine would still not recognize territory seized by Russia as belonging to Moscow. For Russia, Ukraine’s NATO membership remains a red line, while Moscow also demands territorial concessions and neutral status for Ukraine. Zelensky said the discussion showed that the NATO issue had returned to the negotiating table.