Key moments over the past 11 years have shaped Ukraine's fate, while a cease-fire framework begins to take shape.

March 2, 2025 | Subscriber Exclusive Dear reader,    Welcome to the Premium Report! As a subscriber, you have exclusive access to our premium content. Our editorial team digs deep to present you with facts that matter, providing a unique perspective on the issues shaping our world. Meanwhile, our designers format it for you into a beautifully curated layout.   We hope you enjoy it.  PREMIUM REPORTS How the War in Ukraine Unfolded and How It Might End Key moments over the past 11 years have shaped Ukraine's fate, while a cease-fire framework begins to take shape. Illustration by The Epoch Times By Andrew Thornebrooke | February 27, 2025 Updated: February 28, 2025   Three years into the Ukraine war, the first steps have been taken toward a possible peace deal.   Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is visiting the White House on Feb. 28 to discuss a framework between Kyiv and Washington that could exchange expansive profits from Ukraine's rare earth minerals and natural gas for possible security guarantees from the United States and its allies.   Washington and Moscow have likewise agreed to begin working toward a framework for ending the war. Those discussions, although they are in the early stages, seem likely to lead to the United States' agreeing to Moscow's demand to never consider Ukraine for NATO membership.   U.S. President Donald Trump has said he thinks that Zelenskyy will have to make concessions to Russia, and the U.S. administration has indicated that it is unrealistic to expect that Ukraine could keep its pre-war borders.   Much remains to be resolved before the conflict can finally come to an end, but it is clear that the first European war of conquest of the 21st century has radically reshaped Europe, both on and off the map.   From a popular uprising to Russia's ongoing invasion, here is a look at some of the biggest events that have shaped the war.   Euromaidan   A wave of mass protests rocked urban centers throughout Ukraine in November and December 2013, with the largest crowds gathering at Maidan Nezalezhnosti (Independence Square) in Kyiv.   The protests were sparked by then-President Viktor Yanukovych's surprise decision not to sign an agreement with the European Union (EU) that had previously been approved by Parliament.   That agreement would have committed Ukraine to anti-corruption measures and additional economic, judicial, and financial reforms to increase its policy compatibility with EU states.   It would also have gradually conformed Ukraine's industries to EU technical and consumer standards while increasing the EU's political and financial support to Ukraine.   Instead, Yanukovych abandoned the deal and unilaterally chose to pursue closer ties with Moscow by signing a deal to sell $15 billion in Eurobonds to Russia that also involved Russia lowering the cost of natural gas.   Protesters condemned the move as sabotage of the nation's attempts to pursue closer ties with Europe. The Euromaidan movement quickly grew because of dissatisfaction about government corruption, abuses of power, human rights violations, and the influence of oligarchs.   Vitaliy Zakharchenko, Ukraine's minister for internal affairs, was forced to apologize for what he described as an abuse of power after an incident in which an elite unit of riot police terrorized a neighborhood where protesters were operating, injuring about 80 civilians, many of whom were not involved in the protests. Anti-government protesters gather on Independence Square in Kyiv, Ukraine, on Dec. 8, 2013. Thousands of people have been protesting against the government over a decision made by Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych to suspend a trade and partnership agreement with the European Union in favor of incentives from Russia. (Brendan Hoffman/Getty Images) Anti-Protest Laws Trigger Further Uprisings   In January 2014, members of the Ukrainian Parliament from Yanukovych's pro-Russian Party of Regions and the Communist Party of Ukraine convened a lightning session of voting while other members of the body were away and could not vote against the measures.   The lawmakers passed a series of 11 laws aimed at quashing dissent and limiting public protests that were quickly dubbed by detractors as "dictatorship laws."   The laws allowed the government to imprison Ukrainians for spreading disinformation on social media or slandering government officials, and it mandated that all internet-based media and mobile phones be registered with the government.   The laws also introduced a 10-year prison term for protesters who blocked entry to a government building, a key tactic among the Euromaidan protesters.   The legality of the vote was called into question, as each measure had passed by a show of hands in a pre-planned fashion that critics said had moved too fast to actually count the votes.   Outrage at the move spurred further uprisings.   Revolution of Dignity   Chaos and violence spread through Kyiv in January and February 2014 as government and police forces attempted to suppress the growing protest movement.   The deadliest clashes took place from Feb. 18 to Feb. 20, when thousands of protesters advanced toward Parliament led by activists with shields and helmets.   Police snipers fired on and killed several protesters before clashes broke out directly between protestors and riot police, at which point many protestors were beaten to death by police while others were shot indiscriminately.   The violence resulted in the deaths of 108 civilians and 13 police officers.   Yanukovych and the opposition signed an agreement to form an interim unity government after his government resigned. Police abandoned central Kyiv and protesters seized control of much of the area, continuing to coordinate operations out of a barricaded protest camp in Independence Square.   Protesters tore down and defaced the statues of Soviet-era communist leaders, which had come to be seen as symbols of malign Russian influence. Protesters advance to new positions in Kyiv, Ukraine, on Feb. 20, 2014. Top officials were evacuated from Ukraine's main government building close to clashes in the heart of the city. (Louisa Gouliamaki/AFP via Getty Images) Yanukovych Ejected From Office, Flees to Russia   Yanukovych secretly fled Kyiv on the night of Feb. 21. The protest movement hailed the moment as a revolutionary victory against a corrupt post-Soviet regime.   On Feb. 22, 328 of Parliament's 450 members voted to remove Yanukovych from office, saying he had abandoned his duties. No one voted against the measure and 36 members of the president's own party voted for it.   Parliament also voted 386–0 to reinstate the nation's 2004 constitution, which was a condition of the previous agreement with the EU that Yanukovych had reneged on.   That night, in a televised address from eastern Ukraine, Yanukovych declared that he would not resign, saying that he was "the legitimate head of the Ukrainian state" and that Parliament's reversion to the 2004 constitution was illegal because he had not signed the action into law.   Yanukovych and other close officials of his regime were prevented by Ukrainian border guards from flying out of the country as leadership in Kyiv unveiled charges of treason and mass murder against him.   He then requested and received support from covert Russian military operators, who smuggled him from Donetsk Province to Crimea and ultimately into Russia, where he received asylum from Russian President Vladimir Putin. Russian President Vladimir Putin (R) shakes hands with his Ukrainian counterpart Viktor Yanukovych in Sochi, Russia, on Feb. 7, 2014. (Alexei Nikolsky/RIA-NOVOSTI/AFP via Getty Images) Counterrevolutionary Protests Erupt   Yanukovych was convicted in March 2014 in absentia of high treason against Ukraine and wanted for mass murder because of his actions against protesters the previous month.   From Moscow, he continued to proclaim that he was the rightful president of Ukraine and to call on Ukrainians to resist what he characterized as an illegitimate government in Kyiv.   Russian state-owned media began to describe the president's ouster as a coup organized by U.S. intelligence, and counterrevolutionary protests erupted in southern and eastern Ukraine, where most of the population speak Russian as their first language.   Out of fear that pro-Yanukovych protesters in east Ukraine were being influenced by Russian propaganda, the Ukrainian Parliament adopted a bill to revoke the status of Russian as an official state language.   The bill was not enacted but caused mass outrage and fear in the eastern and southern regions of Ukraine.   Thousands of counterrevolutionary protesters marched against the new government in several major cities.   In Kharkiv, anti-government demonstrators guarded a statue of communist leader Vladimir Lenin and blocked officials from entering the city council building.   Public surveys revealed that most people in Ukraine's Russian-speaking east considered all levels of the new government to be illegitimate... 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