WASHINGTON — President Trump said Monday that he would reveal the contents of his proposed peace plan for the Ukraine war this week — which could include European troops in the battle-torn country to enforce the proposed cease-fire.
The US expects Russia and Ukraine to respond to a peace deal after Trump on Friday threatened to end America’s involvement in the cease-fire talks after months of Washington discussions with both warring parties.
“I will be giving you a full detail over the next three days,” Trump told reporters. “But we had very good meetings on Ukraine, Russia … We’ll see how that works.”
While the terms are not yet set in stone as Kyiv and Moscow internally discuss the plan, one senior administration official told The Post they may include deploying European forces to Ukraine should an end to the war and cease-fire be reached.
“The hard part is what does a security force look like — we’re calling that a ‘resiliency force,’” the official said.
“The resiliency force is part of the security guarantees that the Ukrainians want and we hope they get.”
Also on the table is a separate peacekeeping force to monitor any cease-fire, which would look like a “joint commission” of Russians, Ukrainians and a third, non-NATO country watching the frontlines to ensure both sides are putting their weapons down.
The US may be involved, as well — not as “boots on the ground, but the monetary force, along with a third party,” the official said.
The proposal may also include the US’ recognition of Ukraine’s Crimea as Russian territory, the Wall Street Journal reported on Sunday.
Trump’s first administration was opposed to recognizing Crimea, which Russia annexed after it invaded Ukraine in 2014, as under Moscow’s sovereignty. So, too, has every other US president since the annexation. Kyiv has previously drawn a red line on recognizing any annexed territory as Russian.
While The Post could not independently verify the report, a senior administration official on Friday said that Kyiv during talks with a US delegation last week was most concerned about the “land” portion of the agreement, referencing the recognition of Russian-occupied portions of Ukraine as being Moscow’s sovereign territory.
The official said Ukraine was seemingly “willing to give up 20% of its land” so long as it was considered a “de facto” recognition of the territory and not “de jure.”
“‘De facto’ means we recognize the Russians occupy this land, but we don’t say [Ukraine is] going to give it up forever,” the official said. “‘De jure’ means we acknowledge that [the Russians] take in this land and we’ll never see it back again.”
While details of the plan begin to surface, it’s unclear where the parties stand on the arrangement as both Kyiv and Moscow review the possible terms and deny reports they are likely to sign on to prevent the US from leaving the table.
The senior official had said Ukrainian Defense Minister Rustem Umerov indicated Ukraine was about “90%” aligned with the US-proposed peace deal they discussed last week in Paris with Secretary of State Marco Rubio and special presidential envoys Steve Witkoff and Keith Kellogg.
But Umerov over the weekend denied The Post’s source’s statement, telling Sky News that his office “doesn’t make political decisions.”
“We have several principled positions: we supported the US proposal for a full cease-fire back on March 11, while Russia did not support the US cease-fire proposal and continues daily strikes on Ukrainian cities and infrastructure.
“Under these conditions, it is unclear how anyone could discuss or measure in ‘percentages’ the progress of any dialogue.
Still, he was one of two top Ukrainian officials who made up Kyiv’s delegation at the discussions and were expected to go home and present the possibilities to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.
“Our key question is how to ensure the cease-fire proposal can work and be reliably monitored,” he said in the statement. “We remain in constructive dialogue with our American partners and are fully committed to ending this war.”
Russia, meanwhile, has not yet indicated whether it is serious about a peace deal after delaying Trump’s pushes for a cease-fire and agreement for more than a month. Witkoff will attempt to change that this week, offering one last, best offer — which may include a reduction of sanctions, according to officials.
Russian President Vladimir Putin on Monday said the Kremlin would “analyze and review” the results of a 30-hour cease-fire he declared — and repeatedly broke — over the weekend before committing to a longer break in hostilities for which Trump and Zelensky have called.
“Of course, first we must think and carefully evaluate everything and see the results,” he said of the cease-fire his country broke more than 3,000 times. “After all, if you noticed, I said at the very beginning, when I met with the Chief of the General Staff, that we would see how declaring an Easter ceasefire would turn out.”
Trump indicated on Sunday his willingness to work with both Moscow and Kyiv should they agree to end its war.
“HOPEFULLY RUSSIA AMD UKRAINE WILL MAKE A DEAL THIS WEEK. BOTH WILL THEN START TO DO BIG BUSINESS WITH THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, WHICH IS THRIVING, AND MAKE A FORTUNE!
At the same time, Russia on Monday ratified a strategic partnership agreement with Iran, pledging to strengthen economic, military and political partnership with Tehran.
Zelensky’s office did not respond to a request for comment.