Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has called wartime elections unfair to soldiers who cannot vote and floated online voting as a possible way out, he told German broadcaster ZDF. He also said he had asked Washington to secure a winter ceasefire from Moscow, which would protect power and water and open a window for a vote. At home, critics warn that remote voting carries heavy risks, and Ukrainian law makes no room for it.

Russia is heading into another winter of strikes on Ukraine's power plants, substations, and pumping stations. This week, one of its largest barrages on the grid left Kyiv without running water. Washington keeps pressing Kyiv for a vote and a deal, while Moscow's stated price for peace is still more Ukrainian land. Any Ukrainian election therefore depends on a pause that only the Kremlin can grant, and Putin has already rejected a ceasefire on Ukraine's grid.

Why Kyiv calls a wartime vote unfair

Zelenskyy spoke to German satirist Jan Böhmermann on ZDF Magazin Royale, aired on 4 November. A vote under martial law, he argued, would shut out soldiers at the front, about nine million Ukrainians abroad, and millions living under Russian occupation. Under martial law, imposed on 24 February 2022, elections are banned. The troops themselves oppose a vote they could not take part in, he said.

“Allowing elections but not giving soldiers a chance to vote is unfair. It is 100% unfair. We can think about online elections. That may be realistic, but then parliament has to look for and find a solution,” Zelenskyy said, Radio Svoboda reported.

He added that elections split society, and that this is a particular challenge for a country at war.

A winter truce as the window for a vote

Zelenskyy said he had urged Washington to work out a winter truce with Moscow, Kyiv Post reported. He hinted that some in Washington would like him gone, yet said a vote only counts if Ukrainians can actually take part.

“I told the Americans: You can reach an agreement with the Russians for a ceasefire during winter. Then people will have electricity and water, and during that time we can also hold elections,” he said.

Asked why Ukraine would not give up land for peace, Zelenskyy pointed at Moscow. “Putin does not want to end the war. Putin does not accept a ceasefire,” Zelenskyy said, noting that Kyiv had backed ceasefire proposals that Moscow turned down. In excerpts from the interview he posted on Telegram, he said Ukraine would do everything to end the war, “but end it with dignity for us.”

The request answers mounting US pressure. On 10 October, US President Donald Trump said it was time for Ukraine to get a new president. Zelenskyy offered elections if Russia agreed to a full 60-day ceasefire. The Kremlin countered with a halt to strikes on voting day alone. US envoys have also pitched Russian gas transit as a reward for an energy truce before winter, and Moscow rebuffed it. Trump has since met Kremlin envoy Kirill Dmitriev and predicted a “big agreement” ahead of US-Russia-Ukraine talks in Abu Dhabi next week.

No legal path to voting from a trench

Ukraine's Electoral Code requires every voter to vote in person, with ballots handed out by election commission members. In February 2025, Central Election Commission head Oleh Didenko said the commission had long dropped electronic voting and called postal voting wide open to interference. Online, it may be hard or impossible to check that a voter casts a ballot in person and without coercion, Radio Svoboda noted. Estonia, which has voted online since 2005, deals with coercion by letting each new vote cancel the last, so citizens can recast their ballot until polls close.

Political scientist Oleksii Koshel went further on Radio NV, saying the president had been “set up.” He warned that online elections would have catastrophic consequences and noted that the Central Election Commission does not support electronic voting. Because Zelenskyy gives so many interviews, Koshel said, it is hard to tell where he meant to send a signal to the West and where he simply said too much. He urged the president's team to cut back his media appearances.