Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy is to meet US President Donald Trump in Florida this weekend, but Russia on Friday accused him and his EU backers of seeking to “torpedo” a US-brokered plan to stop the fighting.
Today’s meeting to discuss new peace proposals comes amidst Trump’s intensified efforts to broker an agreement on Europe’s worst conflict since World War II.
The latest plan is a 20-point proposal that would freeze the war on its current front line, but open the door for Ukraine to pull back troops from the east, where demilitarized buffer zones could be created, according to details revealed by Zelenskiy this week.
Photo: AF
Trump said Zelenskiy “doesn’t have anything until I approve it,” adding: “So we’ll see what he’s got.”
Meanwhile, the Ukrainian leader said he held telephone talks with NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz and a host of other European leaders ahead of his latest diplomatic foray.
A spokesperson for British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said the leaders “reiterated their unshakeable commitment for a just and lasting peace for Ukraine, and the importance that talks continue to progress towards this in the coming days.”
The new plan includes separate US-Ukraine bilateral agreements on security guarantees, reconstruction and the economy.
“As for sensitive issues, we will discuss [the eastern region of] Donbas and the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, and we will certainly discuss other issues,” Zelenskiy said.
Russia signaled its opposition to the plan ahead of the Florida talks.
The Kremlin said that Russian foreign policy aide Yuri Ushakov had held telephone talks with US officials and Russian Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Sergei Ryabkov criticized Zelenskiy’s stance.
“Our ability to make the final push and reach an agreement will depend on our own work and the political will of the other party,” Ryabkov said. “Especially in a context where Kyiv and its sponsors — notably within the European Union, who are not in favor of an agreement — have stepped up efforts to torpedo it.”
The proposal drawn up with Zelenskiy’s input “differs radically” from points initially drawn up by US and Russian officials in contacts this month, he said.
“Without an adequate resolution of the problems at the origin of this crisis, it will be quite simply impossible to reach a definitive accord,” Ryabkov added.
He said any deal had to “remain within the limits” fixed by Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin when they met in Alaska in August, or else “no accord can be reached.”
Tens of thousands of Filipino Catholics yesterday twirled white cloths and chanted “Viva, viva,” as a centuries-old statue of Jesus Christ was paraded through the streets of Manila in the nation’s biggest annual religious event. The day-long procession began before dawn, with barefoot volunteers pulling the heavy carriage through narrow streets where the devout waited in hopes of touching the icon, believed to hold miraculous powers. Thousands of police were deployed to manage crowds that officials believe could number in the millions by the time the statue reaches its home in central Manila’s Quiapo church around midnight. More than 800 people had sought
DENIAL: Pyongyang said a South Korean drone filmed unspecified areas in a North Korean border town, but Seoul said it did not operate drones on the dates it cited North Korea’s military accused South Korea of flying drones across the border between the nations this week, yesterday warning that the South would face consequences for its “unpardonable hysteria.” Seoul quickly denied the accusation, but the development is likely to further dim prospects for its efforts to restore ties with Pyongyang. North Korean forces used special electronic warfare assets on Sunday to bring down a South Korean drone flying over North Korea’s border town. The drone was equipped with two cameras that filmed unspecified areas, the General Staff of the North Korean People’s Army said in a statement. South Korea infiltrated another drone
COMMUNIST ALIGNMENT: To Lam wants to combine party chief and state presidency roles, with the decision resting on the election of 200 new party delegates next week Communist Party of Vietnam General Secretary To Lam is seeking to combine his party role with the state presidency, officials said, in a move that would align Vietnam’s political structure more closely to China’s, where President Xi Jinping (習近平) heads the party and state. Next week about 1,600 delegates are to gather in Hanoi to commence a week-long communist party congress, held every five years to select new leaders and set policy goals for the single-party state. Lam, 68, bade for both top positions at a party meeting last month, seeking initial party approval ahead of the congress, three people briefed by
Cambodia’s government on Wednesday said that it had arrested and extradited to China a tycoon who has been accused of running a huge online scam operation. The Cambodian Ministry of the Interior said that Prince Holding Group chairman Chen Zhi (陳志) and two other Chinese citizens were arrested and extradited on Tuesday at the request of Chinese authorities. Chen formerly had dual nationality, but his Cambodian citizenship was revoked last month, the ministry said. US prosecutors in October last year brought conspiracy charges against Chen, alleging that he had been the mastermind behind a multinational cyberfraud network, used his other businesses to launder
RSS