Trump Gives Ukraine Until Thursday to Approve His Plan to End the War with Russia

SadaNews - U.S. President Donald Trump considered that Thursday, November 27, which coincides with Thanksgiving Day, is a "suitable" deadline for Ukraine to agree to the U.S. plan to end the war with Russia. Trump stated in an interview with Fox News that, "I had many deadlines, and when things go well, there is a tendency to extend the deadlines. But I think Thursday is a suitable deadline." For his part, Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Friday that the plan proposed by the United States regarding Ukraine could "serve as a basis for a final settlement" of the conflict, warning of taking control of more territories if Kyiv rejects the proposal. Putin added during a government meeting broadcast by Russian channels that the U.S. plan "could serve as a basis for a final peaceful settlement, but this plan is not discussed with us in concrete terms." According to an analysis conducted by the Agence France-Presse of data provided by the Institute for the Study of War, Russia could gain under the U.S. peace plan for Ukraine, without any fighting, an area of land roughly equivalent to the size of Luxembourg. The U.S. initiative stipulates the withdrawal of the Ukrainian army from areas it still controls, allowing Moscow to achieve a net territorial gain estimated at about 2,300 square kilometers, nearly the size of Luxembourg (2,590 square kilometers), without firing a single shot. Under the plan, Kyiv would give up about 5,000 square kilometers currently under its jurisdiction in the Donetsk region, which would be used to create a buffer zone, as well as a pocket of 45 square kilometers in the Luhansk region. These concessions include the neighboring cities of Kramatorsk and Sloviansk. In return, Moscow would return about 2,000 square kilometers that it claims to fully or partially control in Kharkiv Oblast, 450 square kilometers in Dnipropetrovsk, 300 square kilometers in Sumy, and 20 square kilometers in Chernihiv. The plan also includes recognizing Crimea, which was annexed by Russia in 2014, and the cities of Donetsk and Luhansk as "de facto" Russian territories. Additionally, the plan cements Moscow's control over vast areas currently under its domain in the Kherson and Zaporizhia regions. According to the proposal, this would practically mean abandoning 20% of Ukrainian territory in exchange for recovering less than 0.5%. These calculations are based on data from the Institute for the Study of War regarding areas fully or partially controlled by Russia or claimed by it until November 20, in cooperation with the Critical Threats Project (CTP). Since the beginning of November, the Russian army has advanced into Ukrainian territory by an area of 398 square kilometers, at a faster pace than that recorded in September and October. By November 20, Russian forces had fully or partially controlled 19.3% of Ukraine's territory, noting that about 7% of the land, which includes Crimea and parts of Donbas, was in Moscow's hands before the invasion began in February 2022.