More details are emerging from a 28-point peace plan backed by United States President Donald Trump aimed at ending Russia’s four-year war on Ukraine, with several media outlets and officials confirming that the plan, which has yet to be officially published, appears to favour Russia.
Details of the plan also come after US ambassador to the United Nations, Mike Waltz, told the UN Security Council on Thursday afternoon that the US had offered “generous terms for Russia, including sanctions relief”.
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“The United States has invested at the highest levels, the president of the United States personally, to end this war”, Waltz told the council.
In the meantime, Russia’s unrelenting attacks on Ukraine continue. A Russian strike on the city of Zaporizhia in southern Ukraine late on Thursday killed five people and wounded three others, emergency services said. Russia has been gaining ground in the Zaporizhia region that houses the southeastern Ukrainian city that straddles both banks of the Dnipro River.
The AFP news agency reported on Friday that the plan, which the US views as a “working document”, says that “Crimea, Lugansk]Luhansk] and Donetsk will be recognised as de facto Russian, including by the United States”.
This corresponds with an earlier report from US media outlet Axios.
The Associated Press (AP) news agency also reported on Friday that the plan would require Ukraine to surrender the Donbas, which includes the Luhansk and Donetsk regions that Ukraine currently partly holds.
Under the draft, Moscow would hold all the eastern Donbas region, even though approximately 14 percent still remains in Ukrainian hands, AP reported.
AFP and AP also confirmed Axios’s earlier report that the plan would require Ukraine to limit the size of its military.
According to AFP, the plan specifically says that the army would be limited to 600, 000 personnel. Ukraine is estimated to currently have just under 900, 000 active duty military staff.
‘ A neutral demilitarised buffer zone ‘
Ukrainian member of parliament Oleksiy Goncharenko shared a document showing what appeared to be the full 28-point peace plan with his 223, 000 followers on the Telegram messaging app, late on Thursday, Ukraine time.
Russia’s state TASS news agency also reported on details included in the document shared by Goncharenko, saying it “purportedly represents a Ukrainian translation of 28 points of the new American plan for a peace settlement in Ukraine”.
New details included in the document shared by Goncharenko include that “Ukraine has the right to EU]European Union] membership” and that the “United States will work with Ukraine to jointly restore, develop, modernise, and operate Ukraine’s gas infrastructure, including pipelines and storage facilities”.
Additionally, according to the document, Ukraine’s “Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant” will be under the control of [UN nuclear agency] IAEA, and the generated electricity will be split equally between Russia and Ukraine in a 50:50 ratio.
According to Goncharenko’s shared statement, “Ukrainian forces will withdraw from the portion of the Donetsk region that they currently control, and this withdrawal zone will be regarded as a neutral demilitarized buffer zone.”
In addition to being illegal under Ukrainian law, giving territory to Russia would be deeply unpopular in Ukraine. Volodymyr Zelenskyy, the president of Ukraine, has repeatedly ruled out this possibility.
Despite opposition from European allies who claim that the US-backed plan favors Russia, Zelenskyy has said he is willing to work with the US on the proposal. On Thursday, Zelenskyy’s office confirmed that he had received a draft of the plan and that he would speak with Trump in the coming days.
Ukraine does not acquiesce to NATO.
Additionally, according to the plan, European fighter jets would be stationed in Poland to protect Ukraine, according to the AFP news agency.
Kyiv would have to accept the fact that there would be no NATO forces stationed in Ukraine and that it would agree to stay away from the military alliance.
Russia’s commitment to stopping all future attacks on Ukraine, which the White House sees as a concession by Moscow, is another information that AP reported.
According to AP, $100 billion in Russian assets will also be used to rebuild Ukraine.
According to AFP, Russia would be re-admitted to the G8 group of nations and re-integrated into the global economy as part of the plan.
Russians and Ukrainians have been involved in the plan, according to White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt, who said US Special Envoy Steve Witkoff and US Secretary of State Marco Rubio have been quietly working on for a month.
Source: Aljazeera
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