EU and US leaders have pledged to protect Ukraine and threatened harsher sanctions ahead of Friday's (15 August) high-stakes summit in Anchorage between US president Donald Trump and Russian president Vladimir Putin.
The leaders of Finland, France, Germany, Italy, Poland, and Ukraine agreed with Trump in a video summit on Wednesday that Ukraine would not be forced to cede territory, the US would take part in any future Western peacekeeping efforts in Ukraine, and there would be harsher Western sanctions if Putin rejected a ceasefire.
"Things were very clear and expressed as such by president Trump, that territorial questions on Ukraine can only be ... negotiated by the president of Ukraine," said French president Emmanuel Macron.
"A country who has lost so many of its children to defend its territory cannot decide lightly to cede any of its territory," he added.
German chancellor Friedrich Merz, who hosted the transatlantic call, said legal recognition of four Russian-annexed Ukrainian regions — Donetsk, Kherson, Luhansk, and Zaporizhzhia — was "out of the question".
Zelenskyy told media: "We will not withdraw from Donbas [the Donetsk and Luhansk area], we cannot do that".
Britain and France had formerly said they'd provide soldiers for a peacekeeping force in an informal 'coalition of the willing'.
And they welcomed Trump's indications on Wednesday that the force would have US support.
"We, the coalition, are stepping up, showing what we can do with credible military plans, alongside that with the backing of the US," said UK prime minister Kier Starmer.
EU Council president António Costa, who also took part in the call, said there was new "availability from the US together with Europe to strengthen the security conditions once we achieve a fair and lasting peace in Ukraine".
Merz said the EU and US would impose harsher sanctions on Russia if Putin didn't agree to a ceasefire.
"If there is no movement on the Russian side in Alaska, then the United States and we Europeans should ... increase the pressure. President Trump knows this position. He shares it very extensively," Merz said.
Trump himself said there'd be "very severe consequences" for Putin if he didn't play ball.
"We had a very good call ... President Zelenskyy was on the call. I would rate it a 10, very friendly," Trump added, in a stark contrast to his infamous brawl with Zelenskyy in the Oval Office in February.
The EU likewise celebrated the call as a high point in Western solidarity, following a turbulent six months of Trump's second term in office.
"We have had a very good call," said EU Commission president Ursula von der Leyen.
"Today Europe, the US, and Nato have strengthened the common ground for Ukraine," she added.
The readouts were short on detail — for instance, on whether Ukraine would cede ground de facto but not de jure, or what role the US would play in any peacekeeping force.
The US previously ruled out boots on the ground, but Western allies would need US air power, surveillance capabilities, and intelligence sharing even more than its infantry or tanks.
For his part, Estonian foreign minister Margus Tsahkna pointed out in an opinion piece in the Financial Times newspaper on Thursday that the question of territory was also a question of people's futures.
There were 1.3m Ukrainians still free in Donetsk, Kherson, and Zaporizhzhia who would suffer Russian oppression if their lands were handed over even on a de facto basis, he said.
"Once Russia gains control, the cost of reversing it may be measured in decades of human suffering," he said.
Estonia was annexed by Russia from 1940 to 1991.
Meanwhile, Putin stuck to his maximalist position on the eve of the Alaska meeting.
Russian foreign ministry spokesperson Alexei Fadeev said on Wednesday that Russia's goals in Ukraine had not changed since last year.
"The territorial integrity of Russia is bound in our country's constitution ... So the goals of the Russian delegation at the talks in Alaska are dictated exclusively by national interests," Fadeev said.
Putin inscribed his annexation of Donetsk, Kherson, Luhansk, and Zaporizhzhia in the Russian constitution in 2022, making it hard for him to row back.
He also annexed Crimea from Ukraine in 2014, but Crimea wasn't mentioned on Wednesday.
Russia's other goals were: to keep Ukraine out of Nato, to disarm its military, and for Nato forces to pull back to Cold War-era lines in Europe.
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Andrew Rettman is EUobserver's foreign editor, writing about foreign and security issues since 2005. He is Polish, but grew up in the UK, and lives in Brussels. He has also written for The Guardian, The Times of London, and Intelligence Online.
Andrew Rettman is EUobserver's foreign editor, writing about foreign and security issues since 2005. He is Polish, but grew up in the UK, and lives in Brussels. He has also written for The Guardian, The Times of London, and Intelligence Online.