By Burc Eruygur
ISTANBUL (AA) - Despite year-long US-led peace efforts, the Russia-Ukraine war grinds on and is set to mark its fourth anniversary on Tuesday.
Discussions to end the conflict revived after the inauguration of President Donald Trump on Jan. 20, 2025, who wanted to end the fighting in a day.
Since then, besides Trump's summits with his Ukrainian and Russian counterparts, Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Vladimir Putin, and European partners, multiple rounds of talks have taken place in Istanbul, as well as in Abu Dhabi, Miami and Geneva.
The US has set the deadline of June to reach a peace deal, according to Zelenskyy.
Following are key events and moments in the war that started on Feb. 24, 2022:
- Russia announces ‘special military operation’ in Ukraine
Three days after saying Russia would recognize Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk and Luhansk regions as independent states, Putin on Feb. 24, 2022 announced the start of a “special military operation” in Ukraine in a televised address. He called for “demilitarization” and “denazification” of Ukraine and urged Ukrainian army personnel to refuse the government's “criminal orders” and lay down arms in exchange of safe passage.
Russia then advanced into Ukraine, including towards the capital, though it withdrew from the Kyiv region and nearby areas by April 2022.
The global response to the announcement was overwhelmingly negative, with many Western countries announcing sanctions, which have since remained in place.
- Russia captures Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant
Russia on March 4, 2022 took control of the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant, Europe’s largest and ranked among the world’s top 10.
Both Moscow and Kyiv have regularly accused each other of shelling the facility and its surroundings, stoking fears of a nuclear catastrophe. The facility has lost all off-site power nearly a dozen times over the course of the conflict.
Personnel from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) remain stationed at the facility.
- Antalya and Istanbul peace talks
In the initial weeks, Moscow and Kyiv engaged in multiple direct talks, including meetings in Belarus and the Turkish resort city of Antalya.
These were followed by another round of negotiations in Istanbul in late March 2022, where the two parties agreed on a draft peace agreement.
Ukraine, however, later unilaterally withdrew from the process some claim on the insistence of then British Prime Minister Boris Johnson.
- Black Sea grain deal
On July 22, 2022, Türkiye, the UN, Russia, and Ukraine reached an agreement in Istanbul to resume grain exports from three Ukrainian Black Sea ports that were suspended due to the armed conflict.
Under the deal, a coordination center was established in Türkiye to conduct joint inspections at entrances and exits of harbors and ensure the safety of routes.
The initiative, which was extended multiple times, remained in effect until July, 17, 2023. Russia had sought loosening of banking restrictions and the ability to ship its own fertilizer before returning to the agreement.
- Russia annexes 4 Ukrainian regions, Zelenskyy applies for NATO membership
Putin announced the annexation of Ukraine’s Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson regions on Sept. 30, 2022.
The move came after pro-Russia authorities in the regions conducted referendums, which were condemned by the international community, including Türkiye, the US and a number of European nations, as “sham.”
In response, Zelenskyy requested for an “accelerated accession” into the NATO defense alliance. Later, he signed a decree declaring the annexations, including that of Crimea in 2014, null and void. Finland and Sweden also joined the alliance after the war, abandoning years of neutrality.
- Russia withdraws from part of Ukraine's Kherson region
On Nov. 9, Russia ordered its troops to pull out from Kherson, a port city in southern Ukraine, to the right bank of the Dnieper River.
Russian troops had taken control of the city in March 2022 during its initial offensive following the start of the armed conflict.
According to then-Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoygu, the decision was taken to save the lives of its soldiers.
- Wagner rebellion and Prigozhin’s death
After accusing Russian forces of attacking its fighters, the Wagner paramilitary group on June. 24, 2023 moved them from Ukraine to Russia's city of Rostov-on-Don, which Russian authorities labeled as an “armed rebellion.”
The next day, Wagner leader Yevgeny Prigozhin and his fighters were 200 kilometers (125 miles) away from Moscow when they decided to retreat to avoid violence, with Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko acting as a mediator.
Two months later, on Aug. 23, Prigozhin, Wagner co-founder Dmitry Utkin, and several others were killed in a plane crash. Their flight was en route to St. Petersburg from Moscow.
- Ukraine’s EU accession
On Dec. 14, 2023, the European Council announced to open accession negotiations with Ukraine, which was granted candidate status in June 2022.
Ukraine had officially applied for EU membership on Feb. 28, 2022, four days after the start of the war, with Zelenskyy appealing to the 27-member bloc for his country’s “immediate accession under a new special procedure.”
Accession negotiations with Ukraine formally opened in June 2024, and the country completed the screening process in September 2025.
- Russia, Ukraine establish unmanned systems forces
On Feb. 6, 2024, Ukraine announced the establishment of its Unmanned Systems Forces, becoming the first country to establish a military unit dedicated to drone use.
Russia established its own Unmanned Systems Forces in November 2025.
Cheap and disposable, drones have become this war’s defining feature, and the new units reflect the key role unmanned systems will continue to play in warfare.
- Ukraine's incursion into Russia’s Kursk region
Ukraine launched an incursion into Russia’s border region of Kursk on the night of Aug. 6, 2024, with its forces entering the region near the town of Sudzha, approximately 10 kilometers (6.2 miles) from the Ukrainian border.
At its peak, Kyiv claimed it had captured more than 1,300 square kilometers (500 square miles) of the region, where a state of emergency was announced, but was then gradually pushed out by a Russian counteroffensive.
Russia announced retaking the entire region in April 2025.
- Russia acknowledges North Korean involvement
In his announcement of Russian troops retaking control of Kursk on April 26, 2024, Chief of General Staff Valery Gerasimov thanked North Korean soldiers, who, he said, “fought shoulder to shoulder” with Russian servicemen.
The statement marked the first official confirmation of Pyongyang’s involvement in the armed conflict amid reports that 12,000 North Korean soldiers were deployed to Kursk.
North Korea also confirmed it sent troops to Russia under a mutual defense treaty.
- Trump inauguration and Oval Office spat
Trump’s return to the White House marked a significant policy change, as the US moved toward peace efforts.
There was a heated Oval Office exchange between Zelenskyy, Trump, and US Vice President JD Vance on Feb. 28, 2025. The US leaders berated the Ukrainian president, accusing him of showing little appreciation for years of American military and financial backing.
The rift led to a pause in US military intelligence to Kyiv, but the breakdown in relations was short-lived as the two countries signed the long-awaited minerals deal and established a joint investment fund in April. A Trump-Zelenskyy tete-a-tete at the Vatican is said to have led to the breakthrough.
- ‘Coalition of the willing’
On March 2, 2025, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer confirmed plans to create a "coalition of the willing" to deploy troops and enforce a potential peace deal in Ukraine, with the UK and France to take a leading role.
The initiative comprises 35 countries, including many European nations and Japan.
Russia has refused to accept the presence of troops from NATO countries on Ukrainian soil.
- Istanbul talks 2025
After the initial talks in 2022 failed, Russia and Ukraine came together after three years under Turkish mediation in Istanbul on May 16, 2025. The two sides agreed to a “1,000-for-1,000” prisoner swap.
The second and third meetings in Istanbul, on June 2 and July 23, respectively, also led to an exchange of draft memorandums outlining positions of both sides for a potential peace deal.
- ‘Operation Spiderweb’
Just a day before the second round of renewed talks in Istanbul, Ukraine carried out drone attacks on multiple Russian airfields.
The Ukrainian Security Service said planning for Operation Spiderweb took over 18 months and claimed it destroyed as many as 41 strategic bombers across multiple airfields in various regions, including the Siberian region of Irkutsk, whose administrative center is more than 4,300 kilometers (2,670 miles) from the Russia-Ukraine border.
The Russian Defense Ministry said attacks on three bases were repelled, while some aircraft at other airfields caught fire.
- Trump-Putin Alaska summit
On Aug. 15, 2025, Putin met Trump in the US state of Alaska in what was the first meeting between sitting American and Russian leaders since the Ukraine war.
At a joint press briefing following the meeting at the Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson in Anchorage, Trump called the talks “productive,” while Putin invited him to Russia, saying: “Next time in Moscow.”
No agreements were publicly announced, but Putin said they reached an “understanding,” while Trump told Fox News that significant points were agreed upon, with only minor items remaining.
- 2nd Trump-Zelenskyy meeting at White House
As a follow-up to his summit with Putin in Alaska, Trump hosted Zelenskyy and a number of European leaders at the Oval Office on Aug. 16, 2025.
Trump said the meetings were “very good” and addressed security guarantees for Ukraine. He said he was also working to arrange a trilateral with the presidents of Ukraine and Russia. The meeting scheduled in Budapest, however, could not materialize.
Ukraine and Russia have disputed the possible location for talks at the leaders’ level, even offering to host talks in their capitals.
- US proposes 28-point peace plan
In November, a 28-point peace plan, allegedly drafted by US envoy Steve Witkoff and Russian presidential aide Kirill Dmitriev, came to the fore.
Unacceptable in its original form, subsequent discussions involving the stakeholders led to a refined 20-point framework.
The initial document supposedly required Ukraine to surrender additional territory to Russia, limit its military size, and abandon NATO membership, all of which the West says are “maximalist” Russian demands.
- 2026 Abu Dhabi and Geneva talks
Following direct talks in Istanbul in 2025, Russia and Ukraine met and held two rounds of US-mediated talks in Abu Dhabi, the capital of the United Arab Emirates.
The talks, which took place on Jan. 23-24 and Feb. 4-5, resulted in both countries agreeing to their first exchange of war prisoners in five months.
Russian, Ukrainian, and American delegations then met in Geneva for the third round on Feb. 17-18, which is said to have been difficult.