The European Union has put forward a peace framework that extends far beyond the front lines of Ukraine — demanding Russia withdraw military forces not only from Ukrainian territory but from Belarus, Georgia, Armenia, and Moldova's breakaway region of Transnistria as conditions for any comprehensive settlement. The scope of Brussels' position, documented in a paper distributed by EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas, has been characterized by EU officials themselves as a deliberately broad response to what they describe as Russia's own maximalist demands.
The document, titled "European Core Interests in Ensuring a Comprehensive, Just and Lasting Peace and Continent's Security," was reported by Militarnyi and The Ukrainian Review, providing the framework's first detailed public accounting. Its ambition reflects a European strategic vision that treats Russia's military footprint across the former Soviet space as a unified security problem — not a series of separate bilateral disputes.
At its core, the document demands the complete withdrawal of Russian troops from Ukraine, Georgia, Armenia, Moldova, and Belarus, including the removal of Russian nuclear weapons from Belarusian soil. It calls for the demilitarization of occupied territories without granting legal recognition to Russian annexation, and for reciprocal force reductions — with Russia expected to match any Ukrainian military drawdowns. Russia would also be required to provide reparations and contribute to the reconstruction of damage inflicted on European states and companies, with environmental remediation included.
The accountability provisions are equally expansive. The document demands no amnesty for those responsible for war crimes, with international investigator access to crime scenes, and accountability conducted under international law rather than Russian judicial standards. It also calls for free elections in Russia monitored by international observers, the release of political prisoners, the return of deported civilians, and media freedom — provisions that constitute, in effect, demands for domestic political transformation within Russia itself.
The Transnistria dimension carries particular urgency given recent developments on the ground. Intelligence assessments indicate that Russia has significantly expanded its military presence in the separatist Moldovan territory — with personnel figures reportedly rising from approximately 1,500 to 10,000 in recent months, a buildup analysts interpret as Moscow pre-empting exactly the kind of EU pressure now being formalized. The expansion, if confirmed, would represent a major militarization of a territory that has served as a frozen conflict zone since the early 1990s and is now positioned as a potential second front in any regional escalation.
The EU framing of its own position as a response "in kind" to Russian maximalism is a diplomatic signal worth parsing. Brussels is not claiming this document represents final negotiating terms — it is establishing an opening position that defines European interests comprehensively before any process begins. One EU official quoted in connection with the document emphasized that achieving peace depends on mutual obligations, not unilateral Ukrainian concessions.
The framework exposes a growing divergence between European and American approaches to defining what peace actually means. Washington has signaled openness to a frozen-conflict model — a ceasefire along current lines of control that defers territorial and sovereignty questions indefinitely. The EU document envisions something categorically different: a comprehensive settlement that resolves not just the active conflict in Ukraine but the broader pattern of Russian military presence across a swathe of European and Eurasian territory that Moscow has used as leverage for three decades.
For the states named in the document beyond Ukraine, the EU's framing has distinct resonance. Georgia has watched Russian forces remain in South Ossetia and Abkhazia since the 2008 war. Armenia, stripped of its Russian security guarantor after the second Karabakh war, is navigating a delicate westward tilt. Moldova has contended with Transnistria as a Russian-controlled leverage point for thirty years. The EU's decision to name all of these simultaneously signals that Brussels views Russian military entrenchment in the former Soviet space as a structural problem for European security — not a legacy issue to be managed around.
The document does not currently have a formal EU seat at any negotiating table. Washington has mediated the primary diplomatic track for the better part of a year, and the EU's status in any formal process remains undefined. What the Kallas paper does is articulate European interests on the record — and insert the full geographic scope of Russian military presence into a peace framework that simpler ceasefire models would ignore.
In Ukraine, as across nations defending their sovereignty, resilience is not just survival — it is determination to build a better future. The EU's framework is, at its core, a declaration that European security cannot be reconstructed on a foundation that leaves Russian forces entrenched from Transnistria to Belarus.
