US, Kyiv draw up new 19-point plan for peace
Donald Trump and Volodymyr Zelensky are set to negotiate a peace deal for Ukraine with a new plan that still leaves major issues undecided.
Donald Trump and Volodymyr Zelensky are set to negotiate a peace deal for Ukraine following initial talks between their top advisers after Washington and Kyiv drafted a new 19-point peace plan that vastly differs from President Trump’s controversial 28-point proposal.
Ukrainian First Deputy Foreign Minister Sergiy Kyslytsya said both sides felt “positive” over the new plan, which removes limits to the size of Ukraine’s army — and no longer gives blanket amnesty for war crimes committed during the Russian invasion, the Financial Times reports.
While the full details of the new document remain undisclosed, Mr Kyslytsya insisted the latest plan bears little resemblance to the leaked 28-point deal that demanded Ukraine make heavy concessions while asking Russia to barely give up anything.
“Very few things are left from the original version,” Mr Kyslytsya told the newspaper of the new plan. “We developed a solid body of convergence, and a few things we can compromise on.”
The original version sought to shrink Ukraine’s armed forces from 900,000 soldiers to only 600,000, with Kyiv also asked to cede its entire Donbas region, which Russia has failed to conquer for more than a decade.
The deal also called on Ukraine to abandon any hope of joining NATO in exchange for vague security guarantees that would do little to stop Russia from launching a third invasion in the future.
After Sunday’s talks in Geneva between Ukrainian officials and Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Mr Kyslytsya said cutting Kyiv’s army by a third “was no longer on the table.”
Mr Zelensky said in his nightly video address: “As of now, after [talks in] Geneva, there are fewer points, no longer 28, andmany correct elements have been incorporated into this framework. The sensitive issues, the most delicate points, I will discuss with President Trump.”
The plan also leaves the door open for Ukraine’s membership of Nato and postponed a discussion on territorial issues until after a ceasefire.
American and Ukrainian officials also agreed to remove a blanket amnesty for the war crimes committed during the conflict, with the new version now set to address “the grievances of those who suffered in the war,” according to the FT.
Such details would need to be directly discussed by Mr Trump and Mr Zelensky, Mr Kyslytsya said, with Washington expected to reach out to Moscow in the coming days with the new proposal.
“It’s on the Russians to show if they are genuinely interested in peace or will find a thousand reasons not to engage,” he said.
The White House has pushed back against criticism that Mr Trump is favouring Russia in efforts to end the war in Ukraine. Karoline Leavitt, the Press Secretary, told reporters on Monday: “The idea that the United States of America is not engaging with both sides equally in this war to bring it to an end is a complete and total fallacy.”
The Kremlin rejected the counter-proposal, with Yuri Ushakov, a Kremlin foreign policy aide, saying: “The European plan, at first glance … is completely unconstructive and does not work for us,” adding that “not all, but many provisions of this [US] plan seem quite acceptable to us”.
Russian President Vladimir Putin said earlier on Monday that the previous 28-point plan was something that could “form the basis for a final peace settlement” with Ukraine.
Mr Putin noted that the terms of that deal were in line with what he and Trump discussed in their summit in Alaska earlier this year, with Russia eager to discuss more at the negotiating table.
It remains to be seen how Moscow will respond to the updated version of the peace plan that includes the new input from Kyiv.
Trump, who insisted that the 28-point peace plan was never a “final offer,” billed the talks in Geneva as positive, teasing that “something good just may be happening” as the administration works to broker peace.
With the New York Post
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