First, guarantees, then Zelenskyy's summit with Putin: Kyiv outlines agenda for talks

In the course of further negotiations, Ukraine and its partners will develop security guarantees for Kyiv, after which a bilateral meeting between president Volodymyr Zelenskyy with the Russian dictator Vladimir Putin is to take place. This was announced by the minister of foreign affairs Andriy Sybiha during a press conference with his Austrian colleague Beata Meinl-Reisinger.

"We are indeed now at a diplomatic moment when political and diplomatic efforts can bring a just peace for Ukraine closer," the official said.

According to him, the meeting between president Zelenskyy and US leader Donald Trump and European partners on August 18 "certainly accelerated all these processes [towards bringing peace closer]."

Sybiha said that Kyiv "clearly understands" the next steps to stop the killing of Ukrainians and Russian aggression, and the country is currently "in active consultations with all its allies" on the next steps.

"I am confident that in the near future there will be relevant meetings at the level of national security advisors (and on our part, this is head of the [president's] Office] Yermak), on the specific content of the understanding of security guarantees," the foreign minister said.

He noted that such work on safeguards and the future security architecture will be one of the priorities of the negotiating teams.

After that, the minister added, it should be meeting between Zelenskyy and dictator Putin: "In any format. It is very important now to understand and determine both the time frame and the schedule of this meeting."

"The Ukrainian side is ready, because it is the kind of meeting that can provide answers and will be called upon to achieve a just peace," Sybiha summarized.

• Sources told Axios that Rubio, Trump's secretary of state and acting national security advisor, will head a joint US-European-Ukrainian commission to develop security guarantees for Kyiv.
• Meanwhile, the Italian defense minister said that security guarantees for Ukraine, based on NATO's collective security article, may be acceptable to Russian dictator Putin.