The United States and Russia have crafted a strategic proposal aimed at resolving the ongoing conflict in Ukraine, which has persisted for almost four years. This plan reportedly requires significant compromises from Kyiv, including addressing several persistent demands from the Kremlin since the beginning of the full-scale invasion, as shared by an informed source.

Details regarding any potential concessions expected from Russia remain unclear. However, the same source confirmed that the framework includes assurances from Moscow to halt further attacks.

Upon learning of this plan, European diplomats, taken by surprise, emphasized the need for consultations with both Ukraine and themselves.

For the past month, US special envoy Steve Witkoff has been discreetly developing the proposal, seeking input from both Ukrainian and Russian parties to identify mutually agreeable terms, according to a senior US official who requested anonymity due to the sensitivity of the matter.

The official also noted that US President Donald Trump has been informed about the plan and is in favor of it.

The talk of a secret peace plan piled more pressure on Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who is marshaling his country’s defences against Russia’s bigger army, visiting European leaders to ensure they continue their support for Ukraine and navigating a major corruption scandal that has caused public outrage.

Several high-ranking American military officials, including Army Secretary Dan Driscoll, were in Kyiv on Thursday to give a new push to peace efforts and assess the reality on the ground in Ukraine, US officials said.

Zelenskyy’s office said in a statement that he formally received the peace plan on Thursday from American officials. The statement said Zelenskyy expected to talk to Trump in coming days about diplomatic opportunities and what was needed for peace.

Zelenskyy underlined Ukraine’s main conditions for peace and promised to work on the conclusions reached in the meetings with US officials, the statement said.

European leaders have already been alarmed this year by indications that Trump’s administration might be sidelining them and Zelenskyy in its push to stop the fighting. Trump’s at-times conciliatory approach to Russian President Vladimir Putin has fuelled those concerns, but Trump adopted a tougher line last month when he announced heavy sanctions on Russia’s vital oil sector that come into force on Friday.

“For any plan to work, it needs Ukrainians and Europeans on board,” EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said at the start of a meeting in Brussels of the 27-nation bloc’s foreign ministers. She added: “We haven’t heard of any concessions on the Russian side.”

Trump has stopped sending military aid directly to Ukraine, with European countries taking up the slack by buying weaponry for Ukraine from the United States. That has given Europe leverage in talks on ending the conflict.

Plan would give Russia control of the Donbas

It was not clear whether the foreign ministers had seen the peace plan, which was first reported by Axios. The proposal was drawn up by US and Russian envoys, and was said to include forcing Ukraine to cede territory, a prospect Zelenskyy has ruled out.

The Trump administration’s diplomatic efforts this year to stop the fighting have so far come to nothing.

The proposal, which could still be changed, calls in part for Ukraine to cede territory to Russia and to abandon certain weaponry, according to the person who had been briefed on the contours of the plan but was not authorised to comment publicly. It would also include the rollback of some critical US military assistance.

Russia, as part of the proposal, would be given effective control of the entire eastern Donbas region, Ukraine’s industrial heartland made up of the Donetsk and neighbouring Luhansk regions, even though Ukraine still holds part of it. Putin has listed the capture of the Donbas as the key goal of the invasion.

Witkoff and Kirill Dmitriev, a close adviser to Putin, have been key to drafting the proposal, according to the person familiar with the matter.

A peace deal that requires Kyiv to hand over territory to Russia would not only be deeply unpopular with Ukrainians, it also would be illegal under Ukraine’s constitution. Zelenskyy has repeatedly ruled out such a possibility.

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on social platform X on Wednesday that American officials “are and will continue to develop a list of potential ideas” for a lasting peace agreement which “will require both sides to agree to difficult but necessary concessions.”

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Thursday that there “there are no consultations per se currently underway” with the US on ending the war in Ukraine. “There are certainly contacts, but processes that could be called consultations are not underway,” he told reporters.