Ukraine's talks with NATO over a path to future membership have become increasingly tense and unproductive, according to Ukrainian Foreign Ministry spokesman Georgy Tikhy.

In a recent interview, Tikhy described the discussions as "toxic" (something he said elsewhere weeks ago too) - characterizing the negotiations as repetitive and are no longer making progress. He also indicated there does not appear to be a chance for breakthrough anywhere on the horizon.

NATO file image

The foreign ministry official conveyed his assessment in a recent interview featured on the YouTube channel of journalist Aleksandr Notevsky.

The words gained attention in Russian state media, which subsequently translated some of Tikhy's key statements. "All the arguments and counterarguments have already been presented, and each new round of negotiations on Ukraine’s accession to NATO goes in circles," he said. The discussions "have become, to put it simply, very toxic," he emphasized.

The NATO bloc has consistently held out that "Ukraine's future is in NATO." Secretary-General Mark Rutte had at this summer's annual NATO defense summit, hosted in The Hague, issued similarly optimistic words.

However, what's become clear is that waning American support for Ukraine's military, and even President Trump's stated desire to step back from leadership in NATO amid lack of fair cost-sharing among allies, has resulted in a broad decline in enthusiasm and momentum for Ukraine's accession.

This is where things stand following NATO's June summit:

It was therefore something of a relief that Nato’s summit in The Hague produced a short joint declaration on June 25 in which Russia was clearly named as a “long-term threat … to Euro-Atlantic security”. Member states restated “their enduring sovereign commitments to provide support to Ukraine”. While the summit declaration made no mention of future Nato membership for Ukraine, the fact that US president Donald Trump agreed to these two statements was widely seen as a success.

Yet, within a week of the summit, Washington paused the delivery of critical weapons to Ukraine, including Patriot air defence missiles and long-range precision-strike rockets. The move was ostensibly in response to depleting US stockpiles.

Simultaneously Russia has made steady gains along the almost 1,000km long frontline, and is even expanding operations into a central oblast, beyond the Donbass region.

Georgy Tikhy, via Interfax-Ukraine

Russian forces have also in the last days declared that it maintains full control over the whole region of the Luhansk, where Russian forces made quickest gains early on. The Kremlin has shown patience in this grinding war of attrition, though its advances have been costly in terms of manpower, as it taps reserves and continues recruitment efforts back home.

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