[a][6] Its issuance followed the commencement of peace negotiations between the Ukrainian People's Republic and the Central Powers in Brest-Litovsk (now in Brest, Belarus).

[3] The Universal urged the government and citizens of Ukraine to resist Bolsheviks and other "adversaries" who had devastated the land during the Ukrainian–Soviet War.

[3] It proposed the dissolution of the national armed forces,[b] and the establishment of a people's militia in their place.

[3] The document also reaffirmed all public liberties declared in the Third Universal of the Ukrainian Central Council, scheduled re-elections to the people's councils, and called on all citizens to participate actively in the elections to the Ukrainian Constituent Assembly.

[7] John Picton Bagge, the former British consul-general for South Russia in Odesa, was appointed as temporary chargé d'affaires and arrived in Kyiv.