The United States is set to recognize parts of Ukraine as de facto Russian, sources told The Telegraph on Friday evening.
The report stated that US President Donald Trump will send special envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner to Moscow to make a direct offer to Russian President Vladimir Putin.
“It’s increasingly clear the Americans don’t care about the European position. They say the Europeans can do whatever they want,” a source told the British newspaper.
On Thursday, Putin stressed that US recognition of Crimea and the Donbas, made up of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions, as Russian territory would be instrumental in negotiations. The Kremlin noted that it received the new peace plan drafted in Geneva, but Russian officials gave indications that they would not accept it.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said that Moscow "thought these understandings had already been formalised, there was a long pause," as reported by the FT.
"Now the pause has been broken by the introduction of this document . . . A whole series of issues there, of course, require clarification.”
How does the report follow US proposals to end Ukraine war?
The report follows reports that in the US-proposed plan to end the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Kyiv would cede Crimea, Donetsk, and Luhansk. Donetsk would become a "neutral demilitarized buffer zone" once Ukraine cedes its forces.
However, an updated plan introduced earlier this week after talks in Geneva would allow Trump and his Ukrainian counterpart, Volodymyr Zelensky, to negotiate further on territory swaps.
The US president had set a Thursday deadline for finalizing the agreement, but later changed course, saying the deadline "is when it's over."
In the US administration's initial 28-point plan, Crimea and the two eastern Donbas regions would be recognized by Washington as part of Russian territory. The Telegraph report noted that the initial plan had been met with a European counterproposal opposing recognition of the territories under Russia.
Zelensky has not yet disclosed when he will travel to the US to meet with Trump, though it is expected that it will be before the end of the year.