Ukraine’s U.S. Ambassador on Zelensky’s NATO Summit Priorities

For more than four years, the Russia-Ukraine war has dominated discussions among NATO allies and played an immeasurable role in shaping the alliance’s approach to collective defense. Ukraine is once again poised to be a central topic at this year’s NATO summit in Ankara, Turkey, which begins on July 7. Kyiv is hopeful that a shifting dynamic in the fight, which has made it more difficult for Russian President Vladimir Putin to hide the war’s costs from the Russian public, will push the conversation in a fresh direction.

“This is a very serious and powerful moment,” Olga Stefanishyna, Ukraine’s ambassador to the United States, told Foreign Policy in an interview in the lead-up to the summit. While NATO summits in recent years often focused on Ukraine’s aspirations of joining NATO, Stefanishyna said that this time “it’s not about the political consensus or the membership, it’s just simply the obvious fact that the NATO collective defense is no longer possible without Ukraine.”

For more than four years, the Russia-Ukraine war has dominated discussions among NATO allies and played an immeasurable role in shaping the alliance’s approach to collective defense. Ukraine is once again poised to be a central topic at this year’s NATO summit in Ankara, Turkey, which begins on July 7. Kyiv is hopeful that a shifting dynamic in the fight, which has made it more difficult for Russian President Vladimir Putin to hide the war’s costs from the Russian public, will push the conversation in a fresh direction.

“This is a very serious and powerful moment,” Olga Stefanishyna, Ukraine’s ambassador to the United States, told Foreign Policy in an interview in the lead-up to the summit. While NATO summits in recent years often focused on Ukraine’s aspirations of joining NATO, Stefanishyna said that this time “it’s not about the political consensus or the membership, it’s just simply the obvious fact that the NATO collective defense is no longer possible without Ukraine.”

The gathering comes as the war has entered a new chapter, in which Ukraine is increasingly conducting drone strikes deep into Russian territory, targeting energy infrastructure to deprive Moscow of revenue that drives its war machine. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who will be in Ankara for the event, has described this approach as Kyiv’s “long-range sanctions” on Russia. “The fact that so many people across all the territory of the Russian Federation have experienced being under attack means that the circle of people in Russia who will be decision-makers in terms of ending the war is widening beyond President Putin,” Stefanishyna said.

But Russia is also still hammering Ukraine with brutal strikes. On Monday—the eve of the summit—Moscow launched yet another deadly attack on Kyiv, making it clear that Putin still isn’t backing down. Despite this, Stefanishyna expressed optimism that Kyiv’s approach could ultimately fuel diplomatic efforts.

Stefanishyna also discussed how Kyiv hopes the U.S.-Iran peace framework could be applied to the Russia-Ukraine war, what Zelensky plans on saying to U.S. President Donald Trump at the summit, and more.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Foreign Policy: There’s recently been a notable shift in tone from the Trump administration on Ukraine. President Trump and other administration officials have been more critical of Russia over the war and have praised the Ukrainian military. But we’ve also seen the administration flip-flop a lot when it comes to Ukraine. Still, are you encouraged at all by this apparent tone shift?

Olga Stefanishyna: Well, we’re not assessing our relations with the United States based on specific ups and downs in terms of public communication. We have a clear baseline where we have regular dialogue at all levels—the political level, the diplomatic level, as well as military-to-military communication. As long as this engagement is sustainable and unchanging, there’s no reason to put any negative emotions behind that. But first and foremost, Ukraine’s capabilities on the front line and what Ukraine has been showing by developing its own capabilities to deprive Russia from the ability to attack Ukraine, from the ability to fuel the war machine through the proceeds from the gas and oil production, it’s obvious and vivid—and this is what changes the game, this is what changes the rhetoric.

At this point, President Trump also has much more clarity in terms of Russia. Many windows of opportunities have been opened for the Russians since the beginning of the Trump presidency. There was a narrative about normalization, there was a trilateral format for relations with multiple promises to President Trump, and I think a lack of progress at every venue gives a clear picture in terms of what Russia is and what the attitude should be toward building relations. And this gives us the inspiring momentum of thinking creatively that basically ending the war in Ukraine and a cease-fire could look different from circling discussions around a specific plan. There are plenty of different opportunities opening, and I hope the presidents will be able to discuss it in Ankara.

FP: Despite the more positive rhetoric from Trump on Ukraine, there hasn’t really been a shift in policy. What policy changes would you like to see from the Trump administration? What are you saying and prioritizing in your conversations with policymakers and officials in Washington when it comes to the state of the war and what Ukraine needs from the United States at this moment?

OS: It’s very clear that we’re working hard to be able to defend ourselves. We are always very precise in terms of additional capabilities we need to secure Ukrainian cities. We’re not staying quiet when we face atrocious attacks from Russia, but also my president has clearly stated that stopping on the existing line [of conflict] is one of the options on the table, and so many things could be discussed around that.

There is no such understanding that Ukraine is an impediment to peace or any effort, be it military or diplomatic, to stop this aggression. This is a very, very good basis. And we hope that the United States of America will play a critical role in diplomatic efforts. And we’re looking around the White House and Department of State in terms of who could be somebody representing the institutional framework and the team operating on this basis. Now that a deal with Iran is on a specific pipeline, we’re looking forward to having the same institutional prioritization of the issue on Ukraine as the Middle East. And when it happens, I’m sure it will not be a long time before we’ll be able to see the real results.

FP: So, you are hopeful that the memorandum of understanding between the United States and Iran will perhaps allow Trump and those around him to shift their attention more toward Ukraine and a resolution of the conflict?

OS: Yes, and like it or not, the whole crisis in terms of managing the situation with Iran has created a very strong and powerful institutional framework within the White House and Department of State. It’s a perfect setting, which could be replicated for Ukraine when the moment comes. We hope this moment is not that far away.

FP: There have been a lot of recent headlines about the success of Ukraine’s new strategy—large drone attacks deeper into Russia and targeting Russian energy. Putin recently acknowledged that there have been fuel shortages, but he also signaled that he remains undeterred in terms of his goals in Ukraine. So, is Ukraine’s strategy truly working? Is it moving Ukraine and Russia closer to peace?

OS: There are a lot of things to say about that, but the fact that so many people across all the territory of the Russian Federation have experienced being under attack means that the circle of people in Russia who will be decision-makers in terms of ending the war is widening beyond President Putin. It really forces the Russian president to look back not only to the army and military structures he relies on, but to look at a wider circle of people within Russia. And this is the largest element of influence, because he has to answer so many questions and cannot hide. This is a very serious and powerful moment, which may become a strategic enabler of diplomatic efforts.

FP: As you said, the strategy has made it much harder for Putin to shield the Russian public from the war. They’re feeling it much more directly. In light of that, are you at all concerned that Putin might take more extreme measures in response to make Ukraine and its partners and allies feel the pain?

OS: Whenever Ukraine is showing a different reality on the front line and a different perception of us as a winning country, we always hear this non-escalation narrative. But also, whenever Ukraine is not having the best time on the front line, we hear the same. So, that means that we choose to be a winner.

Ukrainian people are also not buying this because basically by asking this question, we feel like it normalizes the current aggression. It’s already the most atrocious war on a global scale since the end of World War II, and has lasted longer than World War I.

The losses for the Russian military are over 1 million people. What could be worse? There’s no way to normalize what is happening right now. People are dying. There are still over 20,000 kids who were kidnapped by the Russian Federation. There’s still thousands of Ukrainian prisoners of war who are tortured by electricity and so poorly treated that you can barely recognize our guys when they’re coming back from captivity. There are over 2 million Ukrainian people who are under the occupation and over 6 million people who’ve fled. And every night Ukraine’s been attacked by dozens and dozens of missiles and now hundreds and hundreds of drones.

FP: Are Kyiv and Moscow holding peace talks on any level? Should we expect to see any movement in terms of peace negotiations in the near future, and to what extent do you believe Washington will be involved?

OS: Dialogue is taking place all the time, even though we’re not talking about any specific peace deal or anything like that. We still continue having a dialogue on the release of the prisoners of war. A release took place not that long ago. This dialogue is regularly preserved. There is also dialogue at the military-to-military level. But currently we do not see momentum where, for example, Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, the American negotiators, would travel to Moscow. After the successful G-7 summit in Évian, [France], after a long, quiet break, Russia suddenly recalled that there is a pending invitation for Steve Witkoff to travel to Moscow, and they wanted to have firsthand follow-up conversations after the talks with European leaders.

Dialogue is there for essential and vital issues, but we are hoping to have more opportunities. While meeting with President Trump [at the G-7], our president discussed meeting in a trilateral format, and he declared his desire and willingness to have a one-on-one meeting with President Putin, and he even wrote a letter to President Putin as a step forward toward starting the process directly. It’s very clear now who’s the impediment to the process.

FP: Ukraine is poised to be at the top of the agenda at the NATO summit in Ankara, and President Zelensky is attending. What are his priorities at the summit, and what will his message to NATO leaders be? What will he view as a successful outcome for Ukraine from this summit?

OS: Hopefully, Zelensky will return from the summit to Kyiv with a significant package of new defense capabilities that he will be able to directly place into military planning and discuss with the war cabinet. Russia also knows that Ukraine does not have proper access to anti-ballistic [missile] capabilities that could secure Ukrainian cities from the attacks, so there will be a lot of discussions on that.

And also, one of the things that was signaled over the G-7 meeting but will become a major point of discussion at the NATO summit is defense industrial cooperation and making sure that defense production meets defense needs. There’s an understanding that Ukraine’s defense and Ukraine’s ingenuity has changed NATO collective defense forever, and that whatever standards and the capabilities NATO has at their disposal need to be readjusted and renewed, and that defense industrial capacity requires adjustment.

This year, I’m sure that the Ukrainian president goes into the summit with a clear understanding that NATO collective defense is no longer possible without Ukraine. And this is very different from previous years where we were advocating for Ukraine’s membership to NATO and working around political wording, etc. But this year it’s very much clear that it’s not about the political consensus or the membership, it’s just simply the obvious fact that the NATO collective defense is no longer possible without Ukraine. And this changes the narrative a lot, and it’s the background behind so many contributions, which will be now because the capability of Ukraine to defend itself is the capability of NATO to keep on defending its peaceful borders.

FP: President Trump and President Zelensky are set to meet at the NATO summit. What issues will Zelensky prioritize in their discussion?

OS: He expects to follow up on the defense cooperation issues in terms of enabling the production of specific air defense capabilities in Ukraine. But also, my president is planning to have a more precise tactical discussion on the peace efforts. He has something to discuss with President Trump, and maybe it will bring new momentum.