The Russia-Ukraine peace process has largely been stalled since a high-profile August summit in Alaska between U.S. President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin, but discussions appear to be gaining momentum again.
The United States and Russia have been secretly working on a new 28-point peace plan for Ukraine, according to a new report from Axios, and Politico reports that the Trump administration is optimistic that a deal could be reached in the very near future—possibly as soon as this week.
Little is known about the precise details of the proposal, which was apparently inspired by Trump’s 20-point Gaza peace plan, but U.S. officials told Politico that a major breakthrough is on the horizon. A lot is up in the air, and there are no guarantees that this plan will move forward. The Kremlin has already thrown doubt on the proposal, and the lack of information on its components makes it difficult to determine what aspects either side might object to. Still, this is among the first signs of progress in peace negotiations in weeks. According to Axios, the plan focuses on four components: peace in Ukraine, the issue of security guarantees, European security, and the future of U.S. relations with both Kyiv and Moscow.
Russia has previously sought significant concessions from Ukraine, including restrictions on its security alliances, a say over the size and composition of its military, and territorial concessions. From Europe, Russia has also previously sought restrictions on NATO-member forces, including the implied removal of NATO forces from the Baltics. Russia is unlikely to make major alterations to its war aims, in part because of how highly the Kremlin values them, analysts previously told Foreign Policy.
The new plan came about from discussions between U.S. special envoy Steve Witkoff and Kirill Dmitriev, an envoy for Putin and the head of Russia’s sovereign wealth fund, in Miami over the course of three days in late October. Dmitriev told Axios that he’s feeling positive about the plan’s prospects for success because “the Russian position is really being heard.”
Given Dmitriev’s involvement in the process, it seems possible that aspects of the plan focus on restoring economic cooperation between Russia and the United States. Dmitriev, a Stanford-educated banker, has been a vocal proponent of reviving economic collaboration between the two countries. The U.S. and its allies have aimed to cripple Russia economically over its invasion of Ukraine—with Trump recently signing off on sanctions against Moscow’s two biggest oil companies, Rosneft and Lukoil. The news of the Witkoff-Dmitriev plan comes as Russia’s economy is slowing down after two years of growth driven by military spending.
Though Dmitriev is bullish about the plan, the Kremlin on Tuesday said that its stance on a peace deal with Ukraine hasn’t changed. “Talks were held in Anchorage, and so far there’s nothing to add to what was discussed in Anchorage,” Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said in comments to reporters.
Ukraine’s position on the new plan is also unknown. Witkoff spoke with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s national security advisor, Rustem Umerov, about the plan at a meeting in Miami this week, according to Axios, but it’s unclear whether Ukraine is fully on board. Throughout the war, Kyiv has been adamant that it will not accept a peace deal with Russia unless it has a seat at the table during negotiations.
That said, this plan is being discussed at a precarious moment for Zelensky, who is contending with an escalating corruption scandal. The domestic headaches that Zelensky is facing over this scandal, coupled with the pressure brought on by battlefield gains that Russia has made in Ukraine’s eastern Donbas region in the city of Pokrovsk, are seemingly a large part of the reason that the Trump administration believes this peace plan has legs.
Zelensky is currently in Ankara, Turkey, for talks on reviving the peace process and is also set to meet with a delegation led by U.S. Army Secretary Dan Driscoll in Kyiv this week. The arrival of Driscoll and other top military officials in Kyiv—the highest-level visit from Pentagon officials to Ukraine under Trump 2.0 to date—could be a sign that the Trump administration wants to move quickly on this new plan. So far, all that Zelensky has said is that Kyiv has received some “positions and signals” from Washington.
It’s also unclear whether Washington’s allies in Europe support the plan. European leaders have been adamant in calling for a peace for Ukraine that cedes little to Russia. Trump himself has waffled on his degree of support for Ukraine, alternately saying that Ukraine could take back all of its territory and pressing Zelensky to come to a deal with Putin. In October, a mooted summit in Budapest collapsed after Russia refused to compromise on its war aims.