Author of the photo, Reuters
The British newspaper Financial Times reported that Ukraine, under pressure from the US presidential administration, began planning presidential elections and a referendum on a peace agreement with Russia before May 15 this year. BBC sources in the office of the Ukrainian president said that elections can only take place if their security is guaranteed.
According to anonymous Ukrainian and Western officials spoken to by the FT, Zelensky intends to announce plans for presidential elections and a referendum on February 24, the fourth anniversary of Russia’s full-scale invasion.
According to the newspaper’s interlocutors, the Donald Trump administration is demanding that Kyiv hold elections because it wants to successfully complete peace negotiations between Ukraine and Russia this spring. Otherwise, it threatens to deprive Ukraine of the security guarantees that the United States also plans to provide as part of the peace agreement.
Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky also told reporters last Friday that the United States proposes to end the war before the beginning of summer.
Holding elections in Ukraine was one of Moscow’s initial demands in its negotiations with the new US administration. According to many Ukrainian and European politicians and observers, Moscow is counting on wartime elections to further destabilize Ukraine from within.
As FT journalists note, if Ukraine does agree to hold elections, this will be a serious concession on the part of Zelensky, who has repeatedly stated that elections are impossible while the country is under martial law, millions of Ukrainians have fled the war to the west of the country and abroad, and about 20% of the country is under Russian occupation.
In response to a request to comment on the publication, a source in the Office of the President of Ukraine told the BBC Ukrainian Service: “As long as there is no security, there will be no announcements about the elections.”
At the same time, the Ukrainian state agency Ukrinform quotes the words of its source in the OP: “If Russians kill every day, then how can elections be announced or seriously considered in the coming weeks. Nobody is against elections, but there must be security.”
What’s stopping the elections?
FT interlocutors from both the Ukrainian and Western sides emphasized that this plan – to hold elections and a referendum by mid-May – is unlikely to come true, since it depends on too many factors, including whether Russian leader Vladimir Putin will agree to conclude a peace agreement.
Russia has repeatedly stated that if Ukraine does not agree to its demands – including maximalist and obviously unacceptable for Ukraine – then it will seize the territory of Donbass by force. This is what she continues to do – slowly and with huge losses.
Russia, as a condition of the peace agreement, demands, in particular, that Ukraine give it the remaining part of the Donetsk region. Kyiv has so far resolutely refused to do this.
At the same time, as interlocutors close to the Ukrainian president’s team told the FT, Zelensky and his entourage made it clear to the Trump administration that, despite all the problems associated with elections in wartime, they are ready to act very quickly.
Author of the photo, EPA
According to preliminary plans, which the newspaper learned about, the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine in March and April will deal with changes in laws necessary for holding elections. For now, Ukrainian legislation prohibits elections under martial law.
Even if parliament lifts this ban, holding full elections will still be very difficult, given that hundreds of thousands of soldiers are at the front and millions of refugees abroad.
In addition, as Olga Aivazovskaya, an election expert and head of the OPORA Civil Network organization, noted in an interview with FT, if there is no agreement on a ceasefire before the elections, then Russia can easily disrupt the vote.
«[Российские дроны] will be a threat to polling stations throughout Ukraine,” Aivazovskaya explained.
Analysis: Elections are still a long way off
Svyatoslav Khomenko, BBC correspondent in Ukraine:
The morning news that has excited many that on the anniversary of the start of the big war on February 24, Vladimir Zelensky will allegedly announce presidential elections and some kind of referendum in Ukraine, makes us recall the old aphorism: “If there is a sign of ‘tiger’ on a cage with an elephant, do not believe your eyes.” In the “cage” with elections, no elections are visible, no matter from which side you approach it.
In a situation where air raid sirens sound over Ukraine every day, when tens of millions of its residents receive electricity for four to five hours a day, when millions of war refugees will not be able to vote in a hypothetical election, let alone even think about an election campaign is inappropriate.
The working group of the Verkhovna Rada, called upon to develop election legislation, also understands this. According to leaks from there, representatives of all political forces agree that the earliest it will be possible to hold elections that could be called transparent and democratic is six months after a complete ceasefire and the end of martial law.
It seems that even if the bill on immediate elections is written outside the walls of parliament and it is simply “sent down” to the Rada, collecting votes in its support looks like an unrealistic task.
It is also difficult to imagine that Zelensky’s appeal to call elections will be made precisely on February 24 – one must completely misunderstand the mood of Ukrainian society, its associations with this date and the possible reaction to the announcement of the start of the campaign (the vast majority of Ukrainians are against holding elections in a warring country).
Therefore, the comment of the Office of the President of Ukraine that there can be no talk of any elections until a safe situation is established in the country looks more logical than the research of Financial Times journalists.
There remains one factor that plays against all these arguments. Washington does not hide its intention to end the conflict in Ukraine at any cost and as quickly as possible: Vladimir Zelensky says that the Americans are serious about closing the Ukrainian case before the beginning of summer.
But let’s be honest – how many of these deadlines have we already heard during the year of Trump’s presidency, and how did they end in failure? Neither the negotiations in Abu Dhabi, nor such “leaks” as the current one, provided fundamentally new prerequisites for a breakthrough in resolving the conflict in Ukraine to be achieved under the next deadline set by the Americans.
date:2026-02-11 13:18:00