The US-led alliance aims to strengthen Ukraine’s position at the negotiating table, Jens Stoltenberg said but added that any peace deal would involve compromises, including territory.
Stoltenberg said that the West was willing to “pay a price” to strengthen the Ukrainian military, and Kyiv will have to make some territorial concessions to Moscow in order to end the current conflict, Russia Today reported.
The secretary-general did not directly endorse the ceding of Ukrainian territory, but he did bring up the example of Finland, which gave up Karelia to the Soviet Union as part of a peace deal during the Second World War.
Stoltenberg’s statement comes amid growing sentiment that Ukraine may soon be pressed into a peace deal by its Western backers.
It was reported earlier today that the leaders of Germany, Italy and France are going to visit the Ukrainian capital later this month.
KI/PR