The ‘new’ Trump plan to end the war in Ukraine, mentioned here yesterday, is unlikely to come to fruition.
Russia has said that it does not have any official knowledge of the plan or its content. But there are several reasons for it to reject it.
The Telegraph claims that the plan does not acknowledge that the Donbas and Luhansk are part of Russia but only allows for Russia to ‘lease’ the territory:
The Trump administration deal would see Kyiv cede control of the eastern Donbas region, but maintain legal ownership. Russia would pay an undisclosed rental fee for de facto control of the region, officials familiar with the deal told The Telegraph.
There is also the role of NATO which the Trump administration’s plan does not mention:
As European and U.S. officials alike sought clarity, they said many aspects of the plan remained in flux, including the role of NATO and any Ukrainian territorial concessions to Russia.
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One aspect U.S. officials are still pondering is whether and how to mention NATO, the person said. The discussion of NATO has not been previously reported.Ukraine has sought NATO membership as a security guarantee against a future Russian invasion. While some European countries support that, the U.S. has rejected it and Moscow has long demanded Kyiv not join the defensive alliance, viewing that as a threat. The European allies also worry about granting Russia territorial concessions, which they see as rewarding Moscow’s aggression and setting a concerning precedent.
Those European allies who reject the peace plan and are concerned about precedent should look up ‘Kosovo’ and how that came into being.
The prospect of NATO membership of Ukraine was one of the main reasons for starting the war. Russia will not allow NATO, or any other military ‘security guarantee’ for Ukraine, along its western borders. Ukraine’s explicit rejection of entering NATO will have to be part of any acceptable peace agreement.
Ukraine’s acting President is not willing to agree to the plan. He now sees the recent revealing of the corruption scandal involving his friend Mindich as part of an operation to press him to fire his chief of office Andrei Yermak and to accept Trump’s peace plan. He will argue that Russia is pulling the strings on each of these issues:
Zelenskyy decided not to fire Yermak, but to launch counterattack against NABU & everyone involved in investigation of Mindich case, accuse them of working for Russia to force Zelensky to accept Trump’s peace plan. This is stated by Ukrainian MP Zhelezhyak on Telegram:
“The president has decided not to fire Yermak. He will be retained and a counterattack will be launched against everyone involved in ‘MindichGate.’ Now they’ll announce this and will begin a new attack with a ‘Russian connection.’ First, it’ll be media coverage—something like yesterday, when the Office’s ‘garbage dumps’ started spreading something about a ‘Whitkoff plan’ and that the special operation ‘Midas’ is a coercion. And then we expect a powerful counterattack against everyone involved in the investigation in any way.”
Zelenski’s first target is the head of the Servant of the People faction in the Rada, David Arahamia. He was involved in the last few days in calls to dismiss Yermak (edited machine translation):
President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky will initiate the dismissal of the head of the Servant of the People faction David Arahamia at today’s meeting with deputies.
This was announced in his Telegram channel by ex-MP Ihor Mosiychuk, citing sources.
He said that the president will put pressure on deputies with the help of compromising materials, and the peace plan of US President Donald Trump is used in the information field to cover up the rescue of the president’s entourage from responsibility.
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It should be recalled that part of the “Servants of the People” called for the creation of a new coalition and government. Arakhamia, although he stated that this is “a statement of individual people’s deputies”, however, according to Strana, he supports the demand for Yermak’s resignation, which is shared by many other deputies from the SotP.Meanwhile, according to MP Oleksiy Honcharenko, Arakhamia set a condition for Zelensky: to dismiss Yermak, so that the Rada would continue its work and retain the SotP-majority. Arakhamia’s demand was supported by Deputy Prime Minister Mikhail Fyodorov and head of the Military Intelligence Kirill Budanov.
Zelensky, according to Goncharenko, refused.
“A key minister, a key military officer and a key person in the Parliament opposed Andriy Yermak and put pressure on Volodymyr Zelensky to dismiss him. If Zelensky refuses – he will lose the Rada. He will not be able to pass the budget. There will be no coalition,” Goncharenko writes.
The problems for Zelenski are only increasing.
Any strike against the anti-corruption vertical (NABU, the Midas corruption investigation, Pravda.ua media) may cause a harsh backlash from Europe. A strike against Arahamia may cost him the majority in parliament. Any rejection of Trump’s plan may lead to stop of U.S. intelligence that is needed to strike at Russia.
For Zelenski to continue to fight for Yermak, who everyone wants to go, may well cost him his presidency.