Kyiv is sending a large delegation to the upcoming Geneva talks led by Andrii Yermak

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00:00He's also sending a delegation to those talks. It's quite a large delegation led by Andriy Yermak,

00:05Volodymyr Zelenskyy's chief of staff, who is extremely unpopular at the moment.

00:10But there is also Sirhi Kislytse, the deputy foreign minister, who is very popular.

00:15Kirill Obudanov, head of the military intelligence service, is also a popular figure

00:19and seen as not entirely dependent on and allied with the troubled Zelenskyy-Yermak team.

00:26Volodymyr Zelenskyy clearly thinks that after quite a long trip abroad during a major political crisis at home,

00:32it's not the right moment to be going away again.

00:34And as he said, it's a moment of great crisis, a huge dilemma for the country.

00:39And he is staying put in Kiev.

00:40But he's been holding phone conversations with all of the other foreign allies of Ukraine,

00:45the European leaders, most recently Donald Tusk.

00:48And it seems from what they've been saying publicly that they have worked out a strategy

00:52of not making any what Zelenskyy called loud statements,

00:56not saying that this plan is absurd, unacceptable, totally unfair,

01:00which is what many, many commentators are saying.

01:03But they're saying we need to talk about it.

01:05We need to make improvements on this plan, but we want to work with the United States, so on.

01:10So they're being very, very diplomatic.

01:12I think that the hope is that with pressure from Ukraine's European allies

01:16and also from quite a large number of members of the U.S. Congress who've been quite outspoken

01:21against this plan, they're going to be able to get Trump and his negotiating team,

01:27which is made up of Steve Wyckoff, the one who's always pushing Russian viewpoints,

01:32Russian narratives, constantly in contact with this Kirill Dmitriev, Putin's envoy,

01:37and Marco Rubio, the Secretary of State, who's seen as a much more sensible,

01:41well-educated figure, perhaps an old-school Republican in some ways,

01:45who understand things much better and who seemed a bit more reticent about this plan.

01:49So basically, I think they're hoping to get a lot of changes made to it

01:53and also for this deadline of next Thursday to sign on the dotted line to be lifted,

01:58because at the moment, the report's coming in about threats from Donald Trump

02:02and his administration of an immediate cut to aid and intelligence sharing

02:07if the Ukrainians don't sign by Thanksgiving, which is next Thursday.

02:11Of course, that's sending shivers down the spine of a lot of Ukrainians.

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