KYIV, Ukraine — Ukrainians would overwhelmingly reject any referendum that cedes territory in exchange for “peace” with Russia, Kyiv lawmakers warned Wednesday, arguing that no one believes Russian President Vladimir Putin would keep his word and end his invasion.
Kira Rudik, a member of Ukraine’s parliament for the opposition center-right Holos party, said the core issue is trust— which she added is non-existent in her country after 12 years of war and other atrocities.
“The question that we are constantly asking is, who or what will make sure that Putin will keep his part of the deal?” Rudik told The Post. “We know for a fact that since 2014, when Russia first attacked us, Putin has never held up his end of the bargain.”
Ivanna Klympush-Tsintsadze, representing another opposition party, European Solidarity, agreed that Russia’s goal is to “ensure that we are non-existent, and that will only feed their appetite to attack again.”
“We are seeing in the sociological data right now that the majority of the Ukrainian population is not ready to give in on any part of Ukrainian territory,” she said. “And why is that? Because we know that it won’t stop the Russian Federation. It won’t bring the end of the war.”
As the Trump administration has tried to hammer out a cease-fire and several frameworks for peace deals, pressure has grown on Kyiv to consider territorial compromises after four years of full-scale conflict.
In the Verkhovna Rada, as Ukraine’s parliament is known, Rudik said lawmakers understand that any deal that looks like capitulation would face fierce public resistance.
“The end of the war,” she said, “is when Russia is weakened to the point where they cannot continue.”
To bring that about, Rudik argued, the West should step up its support for Ukraine, building on sanctions, humanitarian aid and munitions.
“We were very good — we exceeded expectations in defending ourselves,” she said. “Give us one more game-changer, and we will change the game.”
Ukraine has been through “dozens of so-called cease-fires that Russia always broke,” Rudik added. “There was no way to complain to everyone and defend ourselves the proper way.”
Another factor in Ukrainian skepticism is the US and UK’s failure to live up to its obligations in the 1994 Budapest Memorandum, in which they promised to protect Ukraine from Russian invasion in exchange for Kyiv giving up its nuclear arsenal.
While the US has now promised non-specific security guarantees — saying it would help Ukraine if Russia attempts to re-invade after a peace deal involving Kyiv’s surrender of the Donbas — Ukrainians no longer believe that will happen.
“The only security guarantee to prevent Russian attacks is for us to get together, ensuring Russia’s strategic defeat and Ukraine joining NATO,” Klympush-Tsintsadze said. “It’s the cheapest, easiest, and most effective way.”
“The only reason Russia doesn’t want Ukraine in NATO is because it wants to attack again.”
While US negotiators claim that Russia would halt its invasion if it received the roughly 15% of the Donbas it does not occupy, the Kremlin itself has not made that promise.
Russia claimed the Ukrainian territories of Donetsk, Kherson, Luhansk and Zaporizhzhia following its February 2022 invasion, illegally incorporating them into its constitution.
The current US-brokered deal would freeze the frontline, meaning both Russia and Ukraine would keep the territory they occupy in Kherson and Zaporizhzhia, while Kyiv would surrender all of its heavily fortified land in Donetsk and Luhansk.
Even if that agreement satisfied Russia temporarily, Rudik warned, the Kremlin is likely to come back for the rest of Zaporizhzhia and Kherson.
“In two or three years, Putin — or anyone coming after him — will say, ‘You know what? We changed our mind. We’re coming back,’” Rudik warned.
“If the question is whether Ukraine gives up the Donbas, and Putin promises not to attack again — people here will not believe that.”
A referendum framed that way would likely fail at the polls, she argued, because Ukrainians would see only risk with no credible guarantees.
“What’s on the other side?” Rudik asked. “Putin’s word? I seriously doubt it.”
Rudik questioned how committed Americans and the rest of the West would be to securing Ukraine if Russia reinvaded.
“Security pledges that promise military support if Russia attacks again basically mean that, if Russia attacks us, those countries will go to war with Russia,” she said. “Is anybody really ready to do that?”
For Klympush-Tsintsadze, Putin’s long-term goals have never been just securing the Donbas for Russia; but reconstituting the Soviet Union — and expanding beyond it.
“We don’t even have to make it up — we just listen to what Putin says,” she said. “He hasn’t changed his plans. In December 2021, he made it clear: He wants to return to Cold War boundaries, claiming the right to control all of Central Europe.
“It’s about destroying the space of prosperity, development, and strength that has been built over decades on the European continent,” she said. “And from there, he will take it further because it’s about a way of life he cannot accept — [the Western] way of life that he cannot stand and refuses to understand.”
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