Moscow could use renewed negotiations with Kyiv and Washington to seek a sweeping rollback of NATO’s military presence in Europe, potentially forcing allies to confront demands they rejected before Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
Russia may attempt to turn a new round of peace talks over Ukraine into a broader confrontation with NATO, demanding that the alliance scale back its military presence in Europe to 1997 levels, according to a report by The Telegraph.
The reported ambition would extend negotiations well beyond the terms of a settlement between Moscow and Kyiv, potentially putting the security arrangements of countries along Russia’s borders at the centre of discussions involving the United States and European governments.
Yuri Ushakov, foreign policy aide to Russian President Vladimir Putin, has said European countries should participate in negotiations between Russia, Ukraine and the US, arguing that Europe would play an important role in reaching agreements.
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But diplomatic sources cited by The Telegraph suggest Moscow may have a broader objective: using an expanded negotiating format to pursue concessions on NATO’s eastward expansion, which Putin has repeatedly described as one of the war’s “root causes”.
A demand to restore NATO’s military footprint to its 1997 position could have profound implications for the alliance’s eastern members. It could entail withdrawing troops from Poland, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, as well as Finland, which joined NATO in 2023.
Such a demand would challenge the security arrangements developed since the end of the Cold War, when former Eastern Bloc countries began joining the alliance. For states that have sought NATO membership as protection against Russian pressure, any rollback would raise fundamental questions about their security and sovereignty.
According to the report, the Kremlin has indicated that Putin could compromise on some issues if his principal demands were met. Those conditions could include restrictions on Ukraine’s sovereignty and a halt to further NATO expansion eastwards.
European officials, however, have indicated that the continent’s position on Russia’s central demands remains unchanged.
One official recalled the response Western allies delivered to Moscow in January 2022. At the time, the West agreed to discuss Russia’s security concerns but rejected demands to withdraw troops and nuclear weapons from former Soviet republics. Putin later cited those demands in explaining Russia’s decision to invade Ukraine.
The possibility of renewed negotiations has also prompted questions in Kyiv about Moscow’s wider calculations. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has suggested Putin’s interest in restarting talks could be connected to potential understandings between Russia and the US that Ukraine does not know about.
Separately, The New York Times reported that representatives of Donald Trump and Putin had discussed a joint gas project in Alaska involving Russian company Novatek, which is subject to partial US sanctions.
Neither report establishes that the proposed energy project is linked to the peace negotiations. But together, the developments underline the breadth of interests potentially surrounding any renewed diplomatic engagement.
For European governments, the central question is whether talks intended to end the war could become a vehicle for Moscow to reopen a wider dispute over Europe’s security order — and whether Washington and its allies would maintain a united position against demands they have previously rejected.
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