A “tremendous amount of progress” has been achieved in talks to finalise a US-proposed peace plan to end the Russia-Ukraine war, Secretary of State Marco Rubio has said.
But “there’s still some work to be done”, Rubio said after meeting Ukrainian and European negotiators in Geneva, Switzerland.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said there were “signals that President [Donald] Trump’s team is hearing us”.
Ukraine and its European allies had expressed concern over the leaked proposals, seen as favouring Russia and welcomed by Vladimir Putin as “the basis” for settlement. Zelensky had said Ukraine “might face a very difficult choice: either losing dignity, or risk losing a key partner”.Speaking to reporters late on Sunday, Rubio said the negotiating teams in Geneva had had a “very good day”.
He said the main goal had been to try to narrow “open items” from the 28-point US plan – and the parties involved had achieved that in a “substantial way”.
However, America’s top diplomat added that any final agreement would have to be agreed by the Ukrainian and US presidents – before the package was sent to Russia – and that there were still a couple of issues they need to continue to work on.
A joint US-Ukraine statement issued later on Sunday said that an “updated and refined peace framework” had been agreed by both countries, and that they agreed to “intensive work on joint proposals in the coming days”.
Several media outlets reported they had seen an alternative plan from Kyiv’s European allies led by the UK, France and Germany. The BBC has not seen the document and Rubio denied any knowledge of its existence.
Earlier on Sunday, Trump accused Ukraine’s leaders of showing “zero gratitude” for US efforts to end the Russia-Ukraine war.
The US president also pointed out that Europe – where Kyiv has some of its staunchest allies – was continuing to buy oil from Russia.
Moscow relies heavily on its oil and gas exports to continue financing its war in Ukraine.
