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By John Feng and Shane Croucher
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Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said Moscow must be involved in decisions about security guarantees for Ukraine, calling it a "road to nowhere" without Russia's participation and consent.
Lavrov, speaking to reporters in Moscow on Wednesday, said Russia supports the U.K., France, and Germany developing collective security guarantees "provided they are truly reliable."
Ukraine's European allies are formulating plans, with U.S. support, for how to guarantee the country's future security and deter Russian aggression. One option under discussion is a collective defense agreement, similar to NATO's Article 5.
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The future of Ukrainian security and territorial control are the two central issues in the emerging peace process brokered by U.S. President Donald Trump. Resolving these challenges will end the war, but Ukraine and Russia are currently far apart on both.
Ukraine Guarantee Without Russia 'Will Not Work'
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Lavrov cited the failed 2022 effort in Istanbul to agree on a settlement that would end the war. He said Russia had agreed to Ukrainian proposals back then, only for the initiative to collapse before it could be signed.
"That is why we cannot agree with the idea that questions of security, of collective security, can now be decided without Russia's participation," Lavrov said, originally in Russian.
"It simply will not work...And I am convinced that in the West, and above all in the United States, they perfectly understand that seriously discussing issues of security without the Russian Federation is a utopia. It is a road to nowhere."
The Russian Foreign Ministry had earlier said Moscow could not accept troops from NATO states on the ground in Ukraine under a security guarantee, one of the proposals under discussion by the "Coalition of the Willing," a group of Kyiv's European allies.
Trump Pledges US Backing to Ukraine Guarantee
Putin told Trump he would "would accept security guarantees for Ukraine," said the American president on Monday, adding that European nations would "take a lot of the burden."
"We're going to help them, and we're going to make it very secure," Trump said, a pledge welcomed by Ukraine and its European allies, who see U.S. support as fundamental to the viability of a security guarantee.
Trump subsequently gave his assurance that the U.S. would not be putting boots on the ground, but could offer air support instead.
"There'll be some kind of security," Trump said during an appearance on "Fox & Friends" on Tuesday, though emphasizing that it "can't be NATO," referring to Ukraine's hopes to join the U.S.-led defensive alliance.
Kyiv's ambitions to join NATO were a central motivator behind Russia's invasion. Moscow says Ukrainian neutrality is vital to its national security interests. But Ukraine says it is a sovereign nation that should be free to make its own security decisions.
Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. It had earlier invaded eastern Ukraine in 2014 and annexed Crimea, the strategic Black Sea peninsula and home of Russia's only warm water naval base.
Around a fifth of Ukrainian territory is now under Russian control.
Update 8/20/25, 9:52 a.m. ET: This article was updated with more information.
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