A ‘100-day plan’ to end the war in Ukraine has been published (Image: Getty)
Hopes that ’s return to the White House will put a speedy end to the nearly three-year-long war in gained momentum after the publication of an alleged US’ 100-day roadmap to ending fighting in Eastern Europe.
Ukrainian news website Strana.ua published a “100-day plan” for bringing the conflict to a close, appearing to offer an insight into Mr Trump’s projected timeline for scaling down the fighting and overseeing peace talks. However, the reporting by the popular news outlet accused of being -leaning, has been already slammed by an Ukrainian official.
The website claimed the plan was reportedly shared by the US government with European diplomats, but has not been publicly endorsed by Mr Trump’s administration and its authenticity cannot be confirmed.
The alleged road map suggests that a preliminary phone call between Mr Trump and could happen in late January or early February – at which point the US President’s team would propose a staggered series of negotiations between the Washington, Moscow and Kyiv over a four-month period.
The alleged plan could then see meetings between Mr Trump, Putin and Ukrainian leader take place from February to March, before, if all goes as planned, a ceasefire is announced on April 20 alongside the withdrawal of Ukrainian forces from the Russian region of Kursk Kyiv troops are currently partially holding.
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A Ukrainian official has denied the authenticity of the ‘100-day plan’ (Image: Getty)
From late April onwards, the “100-day plan” proposes an end-of-war agreement between and to be formalised at an international peace conference and a gradual prisoner exchange on an “all for all” basis.
A full declaration of the end of the – war could then be expected by May 9 at the hypothetical peace conference, the alleged plan suggests.
However, Andriy Yermak, head of President Zelensky’s office, wrote on Telegram that “none of the ‘100-day peace plans’ in the media actually exist in reality,” suggesting instead that they were “planted stories, often legitimised by Russians”.
Putin signalled last week that Moscow is prepared to engage with the US on talks on a range of issues.
In an interview with state television, he suggested that if Mr Trump had been in power when invaded in 2022, the ensuing long-running conflict could have been avoided – and also endorsed Mr Trump’s refusal to accept his election loss in 2020.
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Zelensky pledged not to engage in peace talks with Putin in 2022 (Image: Getty)
“I couldn’t disagree with him that if he had been president, if they hadn’t stolen victory from him in 2020, the crisis that emerged in in 2022 could have been avoided,” he said.
Mr Trump had pledged to quickly end the war in . But his plan for bringing the conflict to an end could be stymied by Mr Zelensky’s decision in 2022 to , with he and other Western nations having denounced the invasion as an unprovoked act of aggression.
Mr Trump, who told Fox News last week that Mr Zelensky should have made a deal with the Kremlin to avoid the conflict, has threatened to impose sanctions and tariffs on if it doesn’t cooperate in bringing the conflict to a close.
Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told reporters shortly afterwards that Moscow was “ready for a mutually respectful dialogue” in line with the one “between the two presidents during Trump’s first presidency”.