Volodymyr Zelenskyy met with Donald Trump in Florida to discuss a new 20-point peace plan to end the war in Ukraine. With the pace of development accelerating, it is telling that Trump has hit the brakes.
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“He has nothing until I approve it,” he commented on Volodymyr Zelenskyy's upcoming visit to Mar-a-Lago.
“The Ukrainian leader has spoken of a peace plan that is ‘90% ready’, but as the guest touts its potential, the host is not buying it – at least not yet,” notes James Matthews in an article for Sky News.
Any breakthrough collapses because of Russian refusal, and Donald Trump needs no reminder of that—a reality that has undermined peace efforts and tested his diplomatic strength with Moscow, often with disappointing results.
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Zelensky and his coalition allies refused to let him back down from the brink — a betrayal, they said, when the U.S. presented a 28-point plan that read like a Russian wish list. The 20-point version developed in Kyiv includes a compromise, and Zelensky spoke of a “good conversation” during a one-on-one meeting with Trump’s envoy Steve Witkoff and son-in-law Jared Kushner.
So far, everything looks promising, but Moscow’s relative silence suggests otherwise. Russian officials have made some optimistic statements, but they have been measured and minimal. Putin has barely changed his initial position on Ukraine, so expectations for change this weekend are limited.
The Russian leader enjoys the goodwill of President Trump, who is changing the US position in Moscow's favor. So Putin feels an opportunity to realize territorial ambitions. Antagonism between the US and its European allies is just one more advantage for Putin from the current state of affairs, the article says. Under such circumstances, a framework proposal that limits his ambitions in the long term will not necessarily be successful in Moscow.
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It's not the first time that any reluctance from Russia will be a test for Donald Trump — his strength, diplomacy, and where the boundaries of his loyalties end.
Previously, the media analyzed why all of Trump's peace deals are doomed to failure.