US offers to ease sanctions on Russia in Ukraine peace proposal
The push comes even as US Secretary of State Marco Rubio suggested on Friday that the Trump administration is prepared to “move on” from its peace efforts unless progress is made quickly
The US presented allies with proposals to enable a peace deal between Russia and Ukraine, including an outline of terms to end the fighting and ease sanctions on Moscow in the event of a lasting ceasefire.
The push comes even as US Secretary of State Marco Rubio suggested on Friday that the Trump administration is prepared to "move on" from its peace efforts unless progress is made quickly. US Vice President JD Vance, though, said in Rome on Friday he was "optimistic" about the chances of bringing the war to a close.
The contours of the US plan was shared during meetings in Paris on Thursday, according to European officials familiar with the matter.
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The proposal would effectively freeze the war, with Ukrainian territories now occupied by Russia remaining under Moscow's control, said the people. Kyiv's aspirations of joining NATO would also be off the table. The people declined to provide further specifics, citing the confidential nature of the discussions.
The Paris talks included a meeting between French President Emmanuel Macron and US envoy Steve Witkoff, as well as discussions among Rubio and national security advisers and negotiators from France, Germany, the UK and Ukraine.
US officials indicated that they want to secure a full ceasefire within weeks, Bloomberg reported earlier. The allies will gather again in London next week to follow up on their discussions.
One of the officials said the plans, which need to be further discussed with Kyiv, wouldn't amount to a definitive settlement, and that European allies wouldn't recognize the occupied territories as Russian. The officials stressed that talks would be moot if the Kremlin didn't agree to stop the fighting, and that providing Ukraine with security guarantees to ensure that any deal holds up was essential.
On Friday, Rubio said that security guarantees aren't an "illegitimate desire" on Ukraine's part, but that negotiators so far haven't drilled down to that level of specificity.
"Every sovereign nation on Earth has a right to defend itself. Ukraine will have a right to defend itself and to enter into whatever agreements it wants to enter into on a bilateral basis with different countries," he said.
Spokespeople for the National Security Council didn't immediately reply to requests for comment.
Following a call between Rubio and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce said in a statement that Trump and the US "want this war to end, and have now presented to all parties the outlines of a durable and lasting peace."
Kyiv has already agreed to a ceasefire and its position is that Moscow needs to agree to one as well before discussing other matters, a person familiar with the matter said. In Paris, the Ukrainian delegation's task was to discuss how any ceasefire would be monitored, as well as a peacekeeping contingent, the person said.
European officials called the Paris meetings constructive and positive. The discussions marked the latest attempt by Europe to influence the outcome by demonstrating that — together with Kyiv — they're fully supportive of US efforts to end the war and that the onus was on Russia to prove that it's serious about negotiating a ceasefire.
Departing Paris, Rubio told reporters he hoped the UK, France and Germany could help "move the ball" toward a resolution — but also suggested US patience with its own mediation efforts is wearing thin.
"We're not going to continue with this endeavor for weeks and months on end," Rubio said. "We need to determine very quickly now, and I'm talking about a matter of days, whether or not this is doable in the next few weeks. If it is, we're in. If it's not, then we have other priorities."
Russia has continued to bomb Ukrainian cities after balking at a proposed partial truce covering the Black Sea. The Kremlin said a separate, 30-day partial truce covering energy infrastructure ended on Friday. A week ago, Russian forces fired ballistic missiles, including one equipped with cluster munitions, at Ukraine's northeastern city of Sumy, killing 35 people.
The Paris talks also built on France-UK efforts to form a postwar "reassurance force" in Ukraine, as well as plans to ensure that Kyiv has an adequately resourced and manned military as part of a package of security guarantees.
Officials in Paris and London are hoping that that proposal would demonstrate that Europe is serious about committing its own resources to Ukraine's postwar future, and persuade Trump to provide a backstop to those guarantees.
Lifting sanctions while Russia continues to occupy large areas of Ukraine could prove problematic for several of Kyiv's allies. Removing European Union restrictions, including unfreezing immobilized assets, requires the backing of all member states.
Witkoff told Fox News this week that the key to an overall agreement revolves around "five territories," without providing more details. Russia insists that its military seizure of parts of Ukraine since 2014, including the Crimean peninsula and large areas of four regions — Zaporizhzhia, Kherson, Luhansk and Donetsk — must be recognized in any accord.
Russia has also linked efforts to stop the fighting to relief from economic sanctions, and has demanded a suspension of arms deliveries to Ukraine as a condition for a ceasefire.
Speaking to reporters in Kyiv on Thursday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy lashed out at Witkoff for "adopting Russian strategy," and said that Trump's envoy had no "mandate to discuss Ukrainian territories, because these territories belong to our people."
"We do not discuss territories until the ceasefire," Zelenskiy said. "We will never consider Ukrainian lands as Russian."
