2nd Day Summary of the YES Annual Meeting 2025

15 September 2025, Kyiv, Ukraine – The Annual Meeting of the Yalta European Strategy (YES) “HOW TO END THE WAR?” was held on 12-13 September in Kyiv. Over 800 leading politicians, diplomats, businessmen, servicemen of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, veterans, civil activists, and experts from more than 30 countries took part in the conference organised by YES, in partnership with the Victor Pinchuk Foundation.

During the second day of the YES meeting, speakers and participants discussed topics including: The State of the Country, The State of the War & What We Need to End It, War on the Ground, Reforms & Fight Against Corruption, Security Guarantees for Ukraine, Is Russia Winning or Collapsing, Drones & the Future of Warfare for Ukraine, Will Historians Consider a Ukrainian Victory and How to End the War?

In conversation with Fareed Zakaria, Host and Bestselling Author, CNN, on ‘The State of the Country’ panel discussion, Oleksii Sobolev, Minister of economy, environment and agriculture of Ukraine, Taras Kachka, Deputy Prime Minister for European and Euro-Atlantic Integration of Ukraine and Sergii Marchenko, Minister of Finance of Ukraine,  discussed Ukrainian investment potential and EU membership.

Sergii Marchenko, Minister of Finance of Ukraine, stressed the importance of continued financial assistance to Ukraine: “We need more money than previous year, because the war continues. We haven't seen a final stage of this war yet. So we need to prepare, we need to prepare our military, we need to prepare our people to fight for another year of war. So we need money. Our uncovered gap for next year is around 16 bn euro, and it's still counting.”

Oleksii Sobolev, Minister of Economy of Ukraine: “We are looking to stimulate investment in Ukraine. We have been approached by the global mining companies who are looking at more and more investment deals. Minerals from Ukraine are important and allow us to be less dependent on China. If we are able to build new tools and models to become less reliant in the supply chain then it is very good. It isn’t just about minerals; it is about energy and infrastructure.”

Victor Pinchuk, founder and member of the Board of Yalta European Strategy, businessman and philanthropist presented a video-message from President Donald Trump.  

In the video The 47th President of the United States said: “Congratulations on the 21st Anniversary of YES. I don’t think war will end on the battlefield, instead it will end on the negotiation table. That is why I had a productive initial meeting with President Putin last month in Alaska, and a very positive Summit with President Zelenskyy and European leaders at the White House. We are continuing to work hard for peace.” 

Chrystia Freeland, Deputy Prime Minister (2019-2024) and Minister of Finance of Canada (2020-2024), said: “Ukrainians know what is best for them. We have become more accustomed to hearing from Ukraine what they need from us. What I am hearing now is what Ukraine can give us. Just as we underestimate how Ukraine responds to war, we underestimate the impact on what they have done in military innovation over the last few years.”

Denys Shmyhal, Minister of Defence of Ukraine, shared his view on what’s needed to put an end to the war in Ukraine: “A strong Ukrainian army, more weaponry, deep strike attacks on the Russian territory, destabilizing (Russian military) bases and strong sanctions. This will lead us to the first stage of the end of the war. The end of this war means that the Ukrainian army is so strong that Putin can't continue his aggression, can't repeat his aggression in the future.”

“We are capable of protecting not only Ukraine, but also Europe. We need to have enough drones, we need to have enough funding to produce these drones. We ask for some artillery, ammunition, but we don't ask for something extraordinary because we have already adapted to this war,” he added.

Commenting on the current state of affairs on the battlefield, Andriy Biletsky, Commander of the 3rd Corps of Armed Forces of Ukraine, said: “The key issue is developing a strategy and new tactical approaches. Whoever develops them first will be the winner without any doubt. Technical solutions already exist and are fairly straightforward. In addition to the ongoing revolution in aerial drones, we are on the verge of another revolution, in my opinion. This is the revolution of ground-based robotic systems, which will radically change the battlefield and replace a significant share of soldiers, both in terms of logistics and combat use.”

Yevhen Moysyuk, Deputy Defence Minister of Ukraine, said: “I am confident that, within a relatively short period of time, appropriate, effective, and sufficiently inexpensive solutions will be developed that can be implemented quickly and on a large scale. This will result in another shift on the battlefield, enabling sufficiently effective manoeuvres to be carried out. Whoever succeeds in this first, will find it easier to prevail.”

Ihor Obolensky, Commander of the 2nd Khartia Corps of the National Guard, said that European states could fall victim to Russia if Ukraine lost the war: "If Ukraine does not hold the ground, European society will be the next one. And believe me, Russia will not give up on its desires."

Andriy Hnatov, the Chief of General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, echoed this view: “I’m appalled that we are watching the dictator prepare for new steps, but for some reason we think that he will not proceed. He definitely will. And everything that is happening, for example, the attack violating the airspace of a NATO member country, Poland was evident. It was not a mistake. It was not an accident. It was a deliberate act of aggression. And to ignore this is the most foolish thing one could do right now.”

Chrystia Freeland, Deputy Prime Minister (2019-2024) and Minister of Finance of Canada (2020-2024), moderated the next panel, ‘Reforms And Fighting Against Corruption’.

Taras Kachka, Deputy Prime Minister for European and Euro-Atlantic Integration of Ukraine, stressed the importance of anti-corruption efforts in Ukraine on the path to EU accession: “Now we approach a tipping point in the accession talks that will require three or four years of very intense work of all government institutions. Because now we've been planning what we need to do. This autumn, when we open negotiation clusters, the negotiations will start, but they will take place in the form of reporting to the EU and negotiating between ourselves on how we change ourselves in order to live according to EU rules, the way of doing businesses, dealing with people, but also in alignment with governmental institutions.”

Semen Kryvonos, Director, National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine, said: “If we talk about the institutional capacity of NABU (National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine) and the Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutor's Office, we can say that this is one of the guarantees of our future accession to the EU.”

Oleksandr Klymenko, Head, Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutor's Office, said: “The fact the number of anti-corruption probes in Ukraine has increased over the years of war is not proof of the rise of corruption. This is the proof of efficiency and higher efficiency of work.”

Ruslan Stefanchuk, Chairman, Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, assured of the parliament’s willingness to back anti-corruption efforts in Ukraine: “The Ukrainian parliament is ready to continue doing its best to ensure that anti-corruption system and fight against corruption in Ukraine is carried out at the highest level.”

Jimmy Panetta, Member of the US House of Representatives, during the panel discussion “Security guarantees for Ukraine’ pointed at the importance of US participation in security guarantees: “I do believe that when it comes to security guarantees, the US has to be there. The US has to provide the backing or the guarantees that need to be provided.”

Igor Zhovkva, Deputy Head, Office of the President of Ukraine, during the panel discussion ‘Security Guarantees for Ukraine’ stressed the importance of providing security guarantees for Ukraine. Among the main components he named strong Armed Forces of Ukraine, European boots on the ground, assurances similar to NATO Treaty’s Article 5, Ukraine’s EU membership and sanctions against Russia. “The number of countries willing to provide contingents or even parts of their contingents is growing. And it’s very good. But it’s only one of the components of security guarantees,” he explained.

Hanno Pevkur, Minister of Defence of the Republic of Estonia, suggested looking at the issue of security guarantees from a different angle: “When we have an understanding that the best security guarantee for Europe today is Ukraine with the strongest army in Europe, then may be this would be easier for us to understand how to help Ukraine win this war.”

Meanwhile, Radoslaw Sikorski, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Poland, downplayed the efficacy of discussion about security guarantees for Ukraine: “If there is some kind of peace, the next time Russia tries something against Ukraine we might go to war with Russia. I find that not very credible, because if you want to go to war with Russia, then do it today. And I see no volunteers. There is nothing more dangerous in international relations than giving guarantees that are not credible.”

“I have an intellectual problem with this whole discussion of security guarantees. Ukraine already has guarantees, they were called assurances, in the Budapest Memorandum. Those assurances have been broken and not only by Russia. I don't see any evidence that Putin is about to make a deal. So my worry is that this self-absorbed discussion about the peace operation is distracting and demobilizing our political class and our public from the more urgent task, which is to find the money and the equipment for Ukraine for next year and the year after that,” he went on to say.

Gillian Tett, FT Columnist and Provost of Kings College Cambridge and Trey Yingst, Chief Foreign Affairs Correspondent, Fox News moderated the panel “Is Russia Winning or Collapsing?”

Niall Ferguson, Milbank Family Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University, criticized a weak response of the West to Russia’s aggression against Ukraine: “The sanctions' regime has failed utterly, partly because no one was serious on either side of the Atlantic about cutting off revenues to Russia from its exports of fossil fuels. But also because of a massive hypocrisy by European states that have continued to export to Russia via third countries.”

 “And now that this project of supporting Ukraine is essentially an EU project, the most urgent thing that we need to discuss is how can Europe possibly match the current scale of arms production on the other side?” he wondered referring to Russia’s building security alliances with China and North Korea.

“Ferguson's law states that if you are spending more on interest payments than on defense, then you will be in trouble quite soon with your foreign policy. So from Putin's point of view, the trends are mostly his friend. Ukraine is reliant on the support of democracies and democracies are fickle. Putin is reliant on support of autocracies”, concluded Ferguson. 

Jade McGlynn, Head of Ukraine and Russia Programme Centre for Statecraft and National Security, King’s College London, invited Europeans to ask themselves some of the questions about the possible outcome of the war in Ukraine: “The question is not how Ukraine defines victory, but rather how Europe sees it. What do we want in Europe? How do we want this war to end? Do we want Ukraine to win? Do we want Russia to collapse? Is there somewhere in between? And once we've decided what we want, then I think we can also talk about to what extent that's realistic or even achievable. But I'm pretty certain that in most European countries, even the most pro Ukrainian, we still haven't really come to terms with the question of what we actually want.”

 Happymon Jacob, Editor, India’s World magazine: “I don’t see Russia collapsing. We need to define what victory is, and what it looks like. Russia has suffered significant losses but that doesn’t amount to its military defeat. Ukraine’s lack of victory and inability to push Russia back is a victory in some way. Russia is increasing its production and increasing its military. We need to define what victory is, before we get it. We need to be clear about the basics.”

Andrius Kubilius, Commissioner for Defence and Space, European Commission, during the panel discussion ‘Drones and the Future of Warfare in Ukraine’ said: “If the predictions, for example, of German intelligence service, that Putin can be ready to test Article 5 (of NATO Treaty) in three or four years, whatever, in Poland, in Baltic States or in Finland even, we shall face battle-tested Russian army which is stronger than it was back in 2022 and which is able to use millions of drones.” 

Major General Christian Freuding, German Federal Ministry of Defense, addressed Europe’s need to upgrade its military and adjust it to modern warfare: “Of course, we have to invest much more into new technology, much more into unmanned systems. And I think what is really a challenge for military decision makers for the years to come is to hit the right balance between what we called legacy systems and between new technology.”

 Sanna Marin, Prime Minister of Finland (2019-2023), Member, YES Board, said: “I think warfare will look very different a year from now. It already is.”

 Eric Schmidt, Founder, Schmidt Futures, also reflected on the changes in modern warfare: “Here is the problem: Europeans are doing exactly the same thing that the Americans are doing. They are doing more tanks. And, by the way, there are no tanks on this battlefield. It’s a land war with no tanks. Do you know why? Because drones kill tanks within about 30 seconds.”

 “Tanks are not needed anymore. What you need is more automated air defense systems. The easiest way for Ukraine to hold and eventually repel Russia is to have an integrated air defense system that does not allow the air war,” he added.

David Petraeus, KKR Partner, Chairman of the Global Institute and Chairman of KKR Middle East, praised Ukrainians’ innovative approach to waging a war: “All of these wonder systems provided by the West are now of a very mixed effectiveness if they are effective at all, because the Russians have indeed deployed countermeasures to them. And Ukrainian systems not only cost 1/10 or 1/20 price of Western systems, they are probably 10 times more effective.”

Oleksandr Kamyshin, Advisor to the President, Office of the President of Ukraine, said: “At this point, we are ready to scale up, we are ready to match Russians, but the point is how we fund it, how we fuel it.”

Timothy Snyder, Professor, University of Toronto, during the panel ‘What Will Historians Consider a Ukrainian Victory?’ said: “Not a sufficient, but a very important and necessary condition for victory, is sovereignty. And sovereignty doesn’t necessarily mean that the state formally exists, it doesn’t just mean that it formally has borders, but sovereignty means some things that we can specify - like the ability to set your own domestic policy, the ability to write your own constitution, the ability to set your own foreign policy.”

Yaroslav Hrytsak, Professor of Ukrainian Catholic University, offered his point of view on what victory could mean for Ukraine: “Our understanding of Ukrainian victory is to leave Russian space and to join the West as a new and transformed Ukraine.”

 Dmytro Finashyn, Hero of Ukraine, veteran, Advisor to the Minister of Internal Affairs on Veteran Policy, said during the final panel: “My principle is, practice as you preach, so when we discuss how we should end the war, we talk about consolidation, and acting together. But we see nations continue to trade with Russia, get richer by supplying the components Russia uses to build their arms. Jet-powered shaheds that we now find it hard to shoot down have a bunch of Western-made components. I won’t name the companies. But we have to make the decision about where we are. Are we on the good side or the bad side? In the light or the dark?.”

Meanwhile, Yehor Firsov, Commander of Muramasa UAV strike unit, 21st Separate Regiment, 3rd Army Corps, concluded: “We have to destroy Russia’s belief in possible victory. The Russians' belief that they can defeat us is busted only by our strength. Only strength, only drones, destruction of enemy equipment, destruction of enemy infantry, our deep-drone flights hitting the refineries and plants producing their drones. Yet this can work the other way round.

What, let's say, makes them believe that they can defeat us? This is a weakness – not just ours, but everyone's.

Pauses, indecisive statements, untimely statements, untimely decisions. All of this gives them an impetus.” 

Oleh Sentsov, a filmmaker and serviceman of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, said: "I don't see this war as a local conflict where Russia attacked Ukraine. This is a broader conflict, with the 'axis of evil' that has already been formed, China, Iran and their other satellites, led by Russia. They are trying to change the world order and expand old borders, create new spheres of influence and work not according to the principles professed by civilised society, but their own authoritarian ones. That is why this is not only a battle for our freedom, it is a battle for the future of this world."

Volodymyr Demchenko, Commander of the Unmanned Systems Battalion, 93rd Separate Mechanized Brigade, said: “We’ve heard a lot about peace. Everyone wants peace for Ukraine. I believe everyone should also realise that there can be no peace with terrorists. With our partners we have to defeat the terrorist state that keeps killing our citizens, our people, our children with impunity. We sustain huge losses of our citizens.”

Mariia Nazarova, Tactical medic and NAEMT instructor, said: I might be the worst person to end this panel, because I do not see the end of this war. I have dedicated my whole life since 2014 to the army. Every time we have come up with something new on the battlefield Russians copy it and do it a bit better.”

Aleksander Kwaśniewski, President of the Republic of Poland (1995-2005), Chairman YES Board, closed the YES Annual Meeting 2025, with the final thought: “We cannot end the war because we have Putin, and we have Russia. He is not interested in finding the end of the war. He wants Ukraine to remain in his sphere of influence, and he will try all methods. The main problem is Putin, and the successor of Putin, as this war is supported by Russians. We admire Ukrainian courage. No one expected you to be so brave, so organised, so determined. Kyiv is independent, free and nice for all guests of the world. Your determination is something we need to continue! We need to continue our support and assistance; military, financially and diplomatic. We too often focus on our own problems. We cannot waste time and efforts on our domestic problems – they are peanuts in comparison. To America - we need fair negotiations, and we need peace. I understand the temptation to get results quicker. We need to be clever, we need to be wise and we need to be patient. This aggression cannot be continued in the world of the 21st Century.”

The partners of the event were: Google, Kyivstar and The International Renaissance Foundation.

Photos are available here and on the website  yes-ukraine.org/ua/photo-and-video 

Videos from the panel discussions and conversations are here www.youtube.com/user/PinchukFoundation

Partners of the YES Annual Meeting 2025:  Alphabet Inc., The International Renaissance Foundation and Kyivstar.