Ukraine began its fourth year of all-out war with Russia on Monday, hosting a slew of European and world leaders for a summit, but unsure it could rely any longer on its staunchest ally, the United States.

Donald Trump denounced Volodymyr Zelenskiy last week as an unpopular “dictator” who needed to cut a quick peace deal or lose his country, while the Ukrainian leader said the US president was living in a “disinformation bubble”.

Beyond the war of words, US officials opened direct talks with the Russian side in Saudi Arabia last week, shutting out Kyiv and Europe in a stunning change of policy on the war.

Washington has made clear it will not send troops as a security guarantee coveted by Kyiv if a peace deal emerges, placing the burden on European powers that are likely to struggle without US backing.

Zelenskiy, who has told Europe to create its own army while urging Washington to be pragmatic, has held more than a dozen phone calls since Friday, mainly with European leaders, to scope out a way forward.

“Three years after the start of Putin’s ‘three-day’ special military operation, Ukraine is alive, fighting and our country has more friends in the world than ever,” Zelenskiy told a summit of visiting leaders in Kyiv for the anniversary.

They included European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, European Council President Antonio Costa and the leaders of Canada, Denmark, Iceland, Latvia, Lithuania, Finland, Norway, Spain and Sweden.

Albania, Britain, Croatia, Czech Republic, Germany, Japan, Moldova, the Netherlands, Poland, Switzerland and Turkiye’s leaders spoke by video link. There was no immediate sign of US representation.

Zelensky called for “real, lasting peace” this year. “This year should be the year of the beginning of a real, lasting peace,” Zelensky told Kyiv’s backers in Kyiv.

“Putin will not give us peace or give it to us in exchange for something. We have to win peace through strength and wisdom and unity,” he added.

Von der Leyen also warned that despite opening talks with the United States on how to end the conflict, Putin was not about to back down.

“Putin is trying harder than ever to win this war on the ground. His goal remains Ukraine’s capitulation,” she said.

She also called the war in Ukraine “the most central and consequential crisis for Europe’s future.”

Turkiye’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who has offered to help broker a deal, told the summit he strongly supported “Ukraine’s territorial integrity, sovereignty and independence” and said both sides must be represented “fairly” in talks.

The visitors paid their respects to Ukrainian soldiers killed in the war, standing in silence before a memorial made up of flags on Kyiv’s central square. Air raid sirens sounded as they met for talks later, though no missile strike followed.

“In this fight for survival, it is not only the destiny of Ukraine that is at stake. It’s Europe’s destiny,” von der Leyen wrote on X.

Thousands of Ukrainian citizens have died and more than six million live as refugees abroad since Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered the invasion by land, sea and air, starting the bloodiest conflict in Europe since World War Two.

Military losses have been catastrophic, although they remain closely guarded secrets. Public Western estimates based on intelligence reports vary widely, but most say hundreds of thousands have been killed or wounded on each side.

Tragedy has touched families in every corner of Ukraine, where military funerals are commonplace in major cities and far-flung villages. People are exhausted by sleepless nights of air raid sirens.

Separately, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on a visit to Turkiye: “We will stop hostilities only when these negotiations produce a firm and sustainable result that suits the Russian Federation.”

Putin’s spokesman meanwhile accused Europe of prolonging the fighting.

“The Europeans continue on the path of a sanctions nosedive, on the path of conviction in the need to continue the war,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters, responding to a fresh package of sanctions levelled by Brussels today.

On the streets of Moscow, there was support for a hardline approach.

Europe and Ukraine “needed to be pushed around to show that they aren’t the most important in the world”, pensioner Irina Svetlichnaya, 77, told AFP.

Russia says ‘agreement’ reached with Ukraine on evacuating Kursk residents

Meanwhile, Russia’s rights commissioner said the country has struck a deal with Ukraine and the Red Cross to evacuate residents from the embattled Kursk region, parts of which have been seized by Ukraine.

Kyiv launched a surprise cross-border assault on the Russian region more than six months ago, capturing dozens of villages and trapping many Russian civilians on the opposite side of the front line.

Some residents have now crossed into Ukraine’s neighbouring Sumy region and are awaiting evacuation via Belarus, Russian rights commissioner Tatyana Moskalkova said.

“There are people who are already in Sumy today. And there is an agreement with the Red Cross and the Ukrainian side that they will be evacuated through Belarus to Russia,” Moskalkova said, according to Russia’s RIA news agency.

Moskalkova did not say how many Kursk residents would be evacuated under the agreement.

A spokesperson for the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said the group was supporting evacuated civilians in the Sumy region, without confirming the agreement.

“For repatriation operations like these, it’s up to the parties to the conflict to agree on the details directly,” Ukraine-based spokesperson Pat Griffiths told AFP.

“Should both parties agree on those details, we stand ready to support the safe and dignified passage of those civilians who wish to return to Russia.”

An official missing persons list compiled by Russian authorities initially recorded only around 500 people unaccounted for in the Ukrainian-occupied zone, but local residents say the number is close to 3,000.

Ukraine says thousands of its own civilians are being held in areas seized and occupied by Moscow since its assault began on February 24, 2022, and that it is providing safe passage to Russians in the Kursk region.

‘They are tired’

Russia launched 185 drones against Ukraine overnight but caused no significant damage, the Ukrainian air force said. Kyiv said it had hit Russia’s Ryazan oil refinery, continuing its campaign to degrade its enemy’s energy infrastructure.

Ukrainian troops face a numerically superior foe as questions swirl over the future of vital US military assistance. It is unclear how much European allies could fill the gap if US support slows or stops.

Evhen Kolosov, head medic at an army stabilisation point for Ukraine’s Spartan brigade that is fighting in the east, said the troops were psychologically worn down.

“They’re fighting on but really those [who’ve been here] since the first days are tired, even more psychologically than physically, in the same way as medics. It’s difficult, but this is war, who said it would be easy?”

Pavlo Klimkin, Ukraine’s foreign minister from 2014 to 2019, said Zelenskiy needed to try to preserve strategic ties with Washington while enhancing relations with Europe, as well as reaching out to countries such as China and India.

Klimkin said he did not think relations with Washington had reached a crisis point yet, despite Trump’s outbursts.

“A tornado is not sustainable, it will pass, but it is very important not to feed it in any way.”

He did not anticipate a peace deal this year that would meet Ukraine’s ambitions for something fair and lasting but said there could be elements of a ceasefire agreement.

At the heart of the US relationship is a deal under discussion that could open up Ukraine’s mineral wealth to the US, with Trump seeking hundreds of billions of dollars to repay Washington for its support.

Zelenskiy refused to sign a draft deal earlier this month, protesting that it was not in Ukrainian interests and did not contain the security guarantees he wanted.

A senior Ukrainian official said today that negotiations with the United States on a minerals deal were in their final stages and that nearly all the key details had been finalised.

Reuters reported that US negotiators pressing for a deal had raised the possibility of cutting Ukraine’s access to Elon Musk’s Starlink satellite internet system, which has played a vital role in Kyiv’s military operations.

Trump has pressed Ukraine to hold a wartime election, appearing to side with Russia which has long described Zelenskiy as no longer legitimate.

Zelenskiy’s mandate was due to expire last May, but no election has been held due to martial law, which was declared at the start of the invasion and prohibits holding elections.

Zelenskiy said on Sunday he was willing to give up the presidency if it meant peace, quipping that he could exchange his departure for Ukraine’s entry into Nato.

China’s Xi hails Russia’s ‘positive efforts to defuse Ukraine crisis’

Separately, Chinese President Xi Jinping hailed Moscow’s “positive efforts to defuse” the Ukraine crisis in a call with his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin, state media said.

Xinhua news agency reported Xi as saying “China is happy to see Russia and relevant parties make positive efforts to defuse” the crisis in Ukraine.

Moscow and Beijing have strengthened military and trade ties since Russia sent troops into Ukraine, though China has sought to depict itself as a neutral party amid the nearly three-year conflict.

Beijing remains a close political and economic partner of Moscow and has never condemned Russia’s actions, leading some Nato members to brand Beijing an “enabler” of the conflict.

Speaking of China’s ties with Russia, Xi said “history and reality” show the two countries “are good neighbours that cannot be moved away, and true friends who share weal and woe, support each other and achieve common development”, Xinhua reported.

The Kremlin later said in a statement that Putin “briefed” Xi on the talks between Russian and US officials held in Saudi Arabia last week — their first high-level meeting since Russia sent troops into Ukraine three years ago.

The Chinese side also expressed support for the start of dialogue between Russia and the US as well as its “readiness to assist the search for a peaceful settlement of the Ukraine conflict”, the statement said.

Xinhua said Putin initiated the phone call.

Both sides have made much of Xi and Putin’s supposedly strong personal bond, with Xi calling the Russian leader his “best friend” and Putin lauding his “reliable partner”.

Monday marks three years since Putin’s decision to launch what he called a “special military operation”.