Axios reported that in return, Ukraine would get a US security guarantee for Kyiv and Europe against future Russian aggression, citing a US official with direct knowledge of the matter.
The White House declined to comment on the matter. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on X that Washington “will continue to develop a list of potential ideas for ending this war based on input from both sides of this conflict”
“Ending a complex and deadly war such as the one in Ukraine requires an extensive exchange of serious and realistic ideas. And achieving a durable peace will require both sides to agree to difficult but necessary concessions,” Rubio said.
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Zelensky, who is holding talks in Turkey with President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, was also expected to meet Witkoff in Ankara, but the meeting was postponed. According to the Telegraph, the Ukrainian president was displeased by the latest proposal after it was briefed to his officials.
In comments on Telegram, Zelensky did not mention Washington’s framework but called for effective American leadership to help bring the more than 3 ½-year-old war to an end.
“The main thing for stopping the bloodshed and achieving lasting peace is that we work in coordination with all our partners and that American leadership remains effective, strong,” Zelensky wrote after meeting Erdoğan.
Ukraine giving up land has been a long-held demand of Putin since he met Trump in Alaska for peace talks in August, but Zelensky has repeatedly ruled out surrendering the entire Donbas. Russia has captured more than 80 per cent of the region since its 2022 full-scale invasion, according to the Institute for the Study of War.
No face-to-face talks have taken place between Kyiv and Moscow since a meeting in Istanbul in July, and Russian forces have continued to grind out territorial gains in the east.
While efforts to revive negotiations appear to be gaining momentum, Moscow has shown no sign of changing its basic peace terms, which also include Kyiv renouncing plans to join NATO.
The Kremlin said Russian representatives would not be involved in the Ankara talks, but that Putin was open to conversations with the US and Turkey about the results of the discussions.
A European diplomat, commenting on the purported new US proposals, said they could be another attempt by the Trump administration “to push Kyiv into a corner”, but added there could be no solution that did not consider Ukraine’s position or that of Washington’s European allies.
Another European diplomat said the suggestion that Ukraine cut its army seemed like a Russian demand rather than a serious proposal.
The latest deal has been thrashed out by Putin’s investment envoy Kirill Dmitriev (left) and Trump’s envoy Steve Witkoff, seen together here in St Petersburg in April.Credit: AP
In another development, it emerged that Trump’s special envoy for Ukraine, Keith Kellogg, is set to leave his role in January, according to Reuters, citing four US sources speaking on condition of anonymity. Kellogg, a retired lieutenant-general, had been widely seen as a key advocate of Kyiv during his tenure.
Meanwhile, a Russian drone and missile barrage on Ukraine’s western city of Ternopil killed at least 25 people, including three children, authorities said on Wednesday, Ukraine time.
The nighttime attack hit two nine-storey apartment blocks in Ternopil, about 200 kilometres from the Polish border, according to Interior Minister Ihor Klymenko. At least 73 people, including 15 children, were injured, emergency services said.
At least 19 among those killed were burned alive, including three children aged 5, 7 and 16, Klymenko said. Two dozen people are still unaccounted for, he said on national television, and rescuers expect to work at least two more days to complete a search of the rubble.
Rescue workers clear the rubble of a residential building which was heavily damaged by a Russian strike on Ternopil, Ukraine.Credit: AP
Russia fired 476 strike and decoy drones, as well as 48 missiles of various types, at Ukrainian targets overnight, Ukraine’s air force said. The bombardment included 47 cruise missiles, with air defences intercepting all but six of them, the air force said. Western-supplied F-16 and Mirage-2000 jets intercepted at least 10 cruise missiles, it said.
“Every brazen attack against ordinary life indicates that the pressure on Russia [to stop the war] is insufficient,” Zelensky wrote on the messaging app Telegram.
Russia’s Defence Ministry said on Wednesday that it had attacked Ukrainian energy facilities and military-industrial targets, including long-range drone depots, in retaliation against strikes by Kyiv on Russian territory.
It said that Ukraine fired four American-supplied ATACMS missiles at the Russian city of Voronezh on Tuesday. All four were shot down, the ministry said, but the debris damaged some buildings. There were no casualties, the ministry said.
Romania scrambled two Eurofighter Typhoon jets and two F-16s when a drone entered the NATO member’s airspace during Wednesday’s Russian attacks on western Ukraine, Romania’s Ministry of National Defence said.
The Polish military also said that Polish and allied aircraft were deployed in the middle of the night as a preventive measure. Poland’s Rzeszów and Lublin airports were closed temporarily to prioritise military aviation, the Polish Air Navigation Services Agency said.
Speaking at a briefing in London, John Healey, the UK defence secretary, also warned that a Royal Navy frigate and RAF Poseidon P-8 aircraft were tracking Russian spy ship Yantar’s every move.
An image of the Russian spy ship Yantar which is operating off the northern coast of Scotland.Credit: AP
The Yantar, designed for intelligence gathering and mapping undersea cables, is currently off Britain, north of Scotland, Healey said. The BBC reported that the laser-pointing episode occurred within the last two weeks.
“We have military options ready should the Yantar change course,” Healey said. “This is the first time we’ve had this action directed against the British RAF. We take it extremely seriously.”
The Royal Navy and RAF routinely shadow potential threats to national security, and such missions to monitor Russian vessels and submarines have become more frequent since Moscow’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
The Russian embassy, in a statement, accused the British government of being “Russophobic” and “whipping up militaristic hysteria”, adding that Moscow has no interest in undermining the UK’s security.
Reuters, AP
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