EUROPEAN Union foreign ministers met today to warn the United States and Russia not to carve up Ukraine without consulting it or them.

Fears are growing in European capitals that a summit between Presidents Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin in Alaska on Friday will agree a framework for a ceasefire that would then be presented to Ukraine as a fait accompli.

Ukraine says it is open to a ceasefire without preconditions, which itself would be the precondition for peace talks.

However, Mr Trump has hinted that “land swaps” may be involved in the talks. Since a Russian counteroffensive drove Ukrainian forces out of Kursk this spring, however, Ukraine does not hold any Russian territory it could swap — unless parts of the Kherson, Zaporizhzhia and Donetsk regions, which are still being fought over, are considered Russian in line with Moscow’s unilateral annexations of them in 2022.

One reported US proposal would be for Ukraine to recognise Russian control of Crimea, Lugansk and Donetsk — which it wholly or almost wholly occupies — in return for a Russian withdrawal from Kherson and Zaporizhzhia, where Ukraine still holds a lot of land.

But Ukraine has said that this would be swapping its own territory for other bits of its own territory, while Russia has not indicated that it would find this acceptable either.

EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas declared ahead of the summit that “aggression cannot be rewarded,” though Nato secretary-general Mark Rutte admitted that “the fact that the Russians are controlling at this moment, factually, a part of Ukraine has to be on the table” if an end to the fighting is to be negotiated.