Ukraine's Draft Peace Plan: Zelensky moves towards demilitarised zones
Newshour
BBC
4.2 • 1.1K Ratings
🗓️ 24 December 2025
⏱️ 48 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
President Zelensky says he's prepared to withdraw Ukrainian troops from the eastern part of the country, if a demilitarised zone is created in its place. He gave details of an updated plan as "the main framework for ending the war", he said it proposed security guarantees from the US, Nato and Europeans for a co-ordinated military response if Russia invaded Ukraine again.
Also on the programme: European leaders have condemned a US visa ban on the official who drew up the bloc's tech regulations; and people in Bethlehem are celebrating Christmas Eve for the first time since the war began in Gaza.
(Photo: NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni take part in a family picture at the Chancellery in Berlin, Germany. Credit: Clemens Bilan/Pool/EPA/Shutterstock)
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | BBC Sounds, Music, Radio, podcasts. |
| 0:09.1 | Hello and welcome to News Air from the BBC World Service. |
| 0:12.4 | We're coming to you live from London. |
| 0:14.4 | I'm James Menendez. |
| 0:15.8 | And we're going to begin the program today with Ukraine. |
| 0:18.4 | And what looks like a possible concession from President Zelensky on the |
| 0:22.0 | hugely sensitive issue of trading territory for peace as the war grinds on towards a fifth year. |
| 0:29.0 | Russia has de facto control of a large swath of eastern and southeastern Ukraine, but seeding |
| 0:34.5 | sovereignty, redrawing Ukraine's borders, would be a step too far for many |
| 0:39.4 | Ukrainians. However, Mr Zelensky revealed today that a compromise has been discussed with American |
| 0:44.6 | negotiators. In the latest 20-point peace plan, agreed by the U.S. and Ukraine at the weekend in Florida, |
| 0:50.9 | he said there was a plan to create a demilitarized zone in eastern Ukraine. |
| 0:56.2 | This is his statement voiced up by one of our producers. |
| 0:59.9 | We are in a situation where the Russians want us to withdraw from the Dernetsk region, |
| 1:04.6 | while the Americans are trying to find a way for this to be not a withdrawal, |
| 1:09.3 | because we are against a withdrawal. |
| 1:12.2 | They are looking for a demilitarized zone or a free economic zone, meaning a format that could satisfy both sides. We consider |
| 1:19.1 | a free economic zone a potential option for a sovereign state to choose such a path. |
| 1:24.3 | Our correspondent in the Ukrainian capital, Kivis Samira Hussain, and she's been telling me more |
| 1:28.7 | about the proposal. Well, one idea that's being put forward that is actually Mr. Zelensky's |
| 1:34.3 | preferred option would be to create a demilitarized zone. And so it would exist exactly where the |
| 1:42.3 | battle lines are right now. And that would be patrolled by peacekeepers. |
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