U.S. Institute of Peace experts discuss the latest foreign policy issues from around the world in On Peace, a brief weekly collaboration with SiriusXM's POTUS Channel 124.

Transcript

Laura Coates: Let's talk right now with former ambassador to Ukraine, Ambassador Bill Taylor. He's also the Vice President of the Russia and Europe center at the United States Institute of Peace. Ambassador Taylor, welcome back and good morning. How are you?

Ambassador William Taylor: I'm good Laura. How are you doing?

Laura Coates: I'm great. You've got the best, I always tell you when I see you, the best radio voice in the business, so I always say I'm so glad to talk to you.

Ambassador William Taylor: No, no. You do, Laura, you do.

Laura Coates: Ha, wow, that's very debatable listening to you. But let's talk for a second about what happened just last week, because President Zelensky obviously came to the United States. He had remarks at the U.N. General Assembly and met with several leaders including President Biden, former President Trump, and of course Vice President Harris. Talk to me about those remarks he made at the U.N. and how impactful you think they may be.

Ambassador William Taylor: Well President Zelensky made the point that he was fighting for all the people in that room. That is, Ukraine is trying to defend itself against the Russians as they invade Ukraine. But Ukraine is also defending values that the United Nations is based on. The United Nations has at its core sovereignty of nations. Every nation is sovereign, every border, every international border is recognized, and what the Russians have done is trash those principles. They've invaded their neighbor. They've violated the borders. They've grabbed territory. So this is the message that President Zelensky was trying to make. He also wanted to highlight it, put a point on it, that the Russians may well attack nuclear power plants which would be a disaster for everybody concerned.

Laura Coates: When you look at the fact that he met with, you know, obviously the U.N. General Assembly, speaking with them, and also the concerns in Congress about funding and continued support, there is a real concern I'm sure he is feeling and experiencing day to day about who might be in the White House. It will have a direct impact, I'm sure, on the pressure to support additional funding, as are the down ballot races that could determine what level of appropriations would be afforded. His meeting with Trump and with Biden is very telling of that very notion. Do you think he should have met with former President Trump?

Ambassador William Taylor: Absolutely, absolutely. It's a smart move to talk to both candidates. He obviously had to go see President Biden. President Biden is still a president until January. He's got some decisions to make. President Biden may take some strong decisions. There are some immediate decisions that the President has to make, that the United States has to make a decision on, and President Biden will be making those. But it's important for Zelensky to know both, and get to talk to both of the candidates, both Vice President Harris and former President Trump. So I think it is a very good move.

Laura Coates: When you're looking at the sustained invasion and where things stand, I always wonder this, as are so many of us, what success would look like for Zelensky at this juncture, so many years into the invasion. Is it realistic to believe that Putin would go silently or compromise in the end?

Ambassador William Taylor: So you're right, it's been a long time. I keep track here, Laura, it's 948 days. 948 days they have been resisting.

Laura Coates: Oh my god.

Ambassador William Taylor: Yeah, when you realize that, and you realize the nation, the Ukrainian nation, the entire country, has been under that kind of pressure and under that bombardment, that's a long time. They're tired. They're very tired. They sure want this to end. And they want it to end so that they can have their country. They want Ukraine. And that's the problem that Putin poses. Putin has said he doesn't think Ukraine is really a country. He wants to just wipe it off the map. He wants to absorb it into Russia. So the Ukrainians, 948 days in, are still defending themselves. And as I said earlier, they're defending us. So is it realistic? Sure it's realistic. The international law, all the people and the United Nations recognizes sovereignty. However, are they going to get it back right away? You know, probably not. Will they ever give up claim to it? No, they will always go for it. Like other nations in the past, they will regain their territory. But it's something that they feel very strongly. They're determined to fight.

Laura Coates: He also made the statement that any parallel or alternative attempts to seek peace are, in fact, efforts to achieve a lull instead of an end to the war. He pointed to his own peace formula as the path forward, rather than suggestions that Ukraine must cede territory to end the war. He's quite clear on these sort of half-hearted settlement plans. He thinks they will empower Putin.

Ambassador William Taylor: And he's right about that. If Putin gets away with violating all these principles, if he gets away with grabbing territory, then other nations, other dictators, other autocrats, will do the same. They will see that Putin can get away with it, so why can't they? This is why it's important for the Ukrainians never to give up claim to all of their territory. Even if they don't get it all back right away, they will eventually get it back. That's what they have to maintain. That's what they're focused on.

Laura Coates: He also called out that North Korea and Iran both have provided weapons to Russia in its ongoing invasion into Ukraine for the aid they support in providing to Putin. And he characterized the ties between those three countries, between North Korea, Iran and Russia, as a telling choice of friends. I mean, the idea of calling out those nations is not without risk.

Ambassador William Taylor: Not without risk, but he makes a good point. It's very interesting that the only countries in the world who will sell weapons to Russia are North Korea and Iran. The Chinese won't even sell weapons to Russia. Why? Because the Chinese know that, like Iran and like North Korea, they'll be sanctioned. And sanctions on China mean a whole lot more than the sanctions on North Korea and Iran. So he's right to call that out.

Laura Coates: He also, I mean, the audience is important, you know? He made these statements in front of the U.N. That, well, Russia holds veto power in the U.N. Security Council as one of the five permanent member states. What is the impact of that, Ambassador, on the ability of the U.N. to do anything besides receive the message?

Ambassador William Taylor: Laura, it's devastating. It is devastating for the credibility of the United Nations, in particular, the Security Council, in particular trying to defer, deter, stop wars. When one of the big five, one of the veto wielding five on the Security Council and that is Russia, can invade and veto any attempt to stop that, any measures that the Security Council would try to take are stymied by the Russians, that means that the Security Council can't do its job. It's devastating for the credibility of the United Nations.

Laura Coates: He says, you know, that the U.N. being powerless is evident, but that a peace formula could actually stop what's happening and he has been speaking about his own as a path forward, again, rather than ceding any territory to end the war. If you read between the lines, of course, and what's been going on, what role does the United States have to play or other nations can play in trying to promote this peace formula or even act as an effective diplomatic liaison between the likes of Putin and, of course, Zelensky.

Ambassador William Taylor: So Putin and Zelensky, in the end, are going to have to have this conversation. They're going to have to have this negotiation. But you're right to ask what the role of the rest of the world is, and United States plays a big role. In the first instance, the United States needs to give the Ukrainians the ability to push the Russians back. It needs to give the Ukrainians the ability to take the initiative, to demonstrate that they can indeed take their land back. Maybe not all, maybe not all right away, but sooner or later, they will have the ability to do that, and that depends a lot on us and the and the Europeans. And so far, we've stepped up. And the international community can also put some pressure. This is part of the victory plan as well that Zelensky is talking about. The international community gets together and puts pressure on the Russians to back off making it clear that the Russians are going to lose in the end, that we're not going to stop, we're not going to fail, the Ukrainians are not giving up, as we talked about. And once Mr. Putin understands that, then he will have no choice but to look for a way out.

Laura Coates: Zelensky was warning about nuclear disaster at the hands of Russia. Now we know Russian forces have seized the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power station in southeastern Ukraine, I believe, which is the largest nuclear power station in Europe. This happened almost two years ago, when this happened. They've destroyed all the country's thermal power plants, according to Zelensky as well. And you know, the concern of course is that this is not going to be something, if nuclear disaster would occur, it doesn't, to have the words of Zelensky say, it does not respect state borders. Various nations could feel the devastating effects, of course, of radiation. This must be top of mind when you are pursuing diplomatic relations and trying to get an end to it. Should there be more pressure to expedite the conversations, or are a lot of nations in a holding pattern waiting to have that discussion happen between Zelensky and Putin and then we're acting as backstops?

Ambassador William Taylor: No, I think the international community and United Nations are taking a look at what they can do to push that security, nuclear security. President Zelensky actually had that at the top of his list at a peace summit that he convened in Switzerland, the Swiss were co-sponsors, and right at the top of the agenda for the hundred nations that showed up and the 80 nations that signed on to an agreement, to a statement, top of that list was exactly what you're asking about nuclear security. And that is a message for President Putin not to do the kinds of things that he's apparently threatened to do in attacking nuclear power plants.

Laura Coates: Ambassador Taylor, thank you so much for joining and allowing us to pick your brain. I can't believe that number you said, was it 900 and you said 46 days? That's just an unbelievable figure.

Ambassador William Taylor: Unbelievable figure. 948 you're exactly right, Laura. Thank you very much for having me.

Laura Coates: Oh my goodness. Thank you, Ambassador Taylor.