Negotiations to end the war are resuming as Ukraine faces internal turmoil and ongoing Russian attacks.
MILES PARKS, HOST:
Negotiations to end Russia's war against Ukraine will continue this weekend in Florida as a Ukrainian delegation arrives for talks with the Trump administration. Joining us now is NPR's Eleanor Beardsley from Kyiv. Hello Eleanor.
ELEANOR BEARDSLEY, BYLINE: Hi, Miles.
PARKS: So, these negotiations will not include the lead Ukrainian negotiator, who resigned yesterday. Can you tell us about it?
BEARDSLEY: Well, his name is Andriy Ermak, and he's Zelensky's chief of staff and right-hand man. They return to Zelensky's televised speeches days before he was elected president of Ukraine in 2019. Ermak is a film producer and former business partner of Zelensky, and they also worked closely together and even lived together in a fortified government complex in Kyiv after the full-scale invasion. Ermak is disliked by Ukrainians, who say he has amassed too much power and was not the man they voted for. Analysts tell me that his American and European allies did not appreciate him either.
In any case, he found himself at the center of a corruption scandal that erupted in mid-November involving at least eight people now under investigation, some close to Zelensky, who are suspected of siphoning more than $100 million from the state atomic energy agency at a time when Ukrainians are at war and hunkered down due to daily power outages. Investigators searched his home on Friday morning, and on Friday evening Zelensky came forward and said he accepted Yermak's resignation in a video address to the nation. Let's listen.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
PRESIDENT VLADIMIR ZELENSKY: (speaking in a language other than English).
BEARDSLEY: He says, “As far as our internal strength is concerned, there should be no reason to be distracted by anything other than defending Ukraine.” And he went on to say: “Russia really wants Ukraine to make mistakes, and we won’t make mistakes.”
PARKS: But negotiations to end this war with Russia continue. How will this scandal affect that?
BEARDSLEY: Some say it made Ukraine more vulnerable and weakened Zelensky. But today I spoke with 30-year-old Dmitry Kotyatensky. He is a young anti-corruption activist and says this investigation and Ermak's resignation do not prove Ukraine is corrupt. On the contrary, it shows that Ukraine can independently investigate and expose corruption, something Russia, he says, will never be able to do. Here he is.
DMITRO KOTYATENSKY: It is incredible to me that during a full-scale war we did not slide into autocracy and are still a democratic country with clear European values.
PARKS: Can you give us an update on the amended peace plan that negotiators are working on?
BEARDSLEY: This is a modified plan after Ukraine and the Europeans weighed in on the very pro-Russian plan presented last week by White House envoy Steve Witkoff. Zelensky supported the plan, but while Russian President Vladimir Putin suggested the plan could still form the basis of a settlement, he said Russia would only end the war if Ukraine left the territory it currently occupies, and he was referring to parts of Ukraine's eastern Donbass region that Russia has failed to capture in nearly four years of fighting. Putin said that if Ukraine does not leave, Russia will still take this land by force.
And the Ukrainians don't think Putin will stop, and it's easy to see why, Miles. The Kremlin continues to attack Ukrainian cities. Just last night there was a massive combined attack of drones and missiles on Kyiv. This lasted 10 hours. Two people died and dozens were injured.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: (speaking non-English language).
BEARDSLEY: This morning we went to an apartment complex that had been attacked by drones. There were burnt-out apartments and broken cars. But it was a hive of activity. Residents collected glass and cut plywood for broken windows. Here's Oksana Honahan, 42, who was sweeping furiously.
OKSANA HONAHAN: (speaking non-English).
BEARDSLEY: She said there were Shahed drones all night long. I asked her how Ukrainians are recovering from all these night attacks?
HONAHAN: (Through interpreter) Ukrainians are the kind of people, you know that no matter how hard they beat us, we will survive, even, like, to piss them off that we're still alive.
BEARDSLEY: Angry that we're still alive, she said.
PARKS: NPR's Eleanor Beardsley in Kyiv, thank you.
BEARDSLEY: Please.
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