Ft: Putin opens up about freezing the front line and stopping the invasion

"We don't intend to discuss the details publicly," US Secretary of State Marco Rubio had clarified last week, referring to the proposals put forward by Washington for a settlement of the Russia-Ukraine conflict: "As soon as these things end up in the media, the initiative falls apart." Yesterday in Moscow, the Kremlin spokesman took the same line, responding to a question from the Izvestija newspaper: 'If anyone here knows about the plan, they have not made it public,' Dmitry Peskov said winking.

Yet, it would be Vladimir Putin's move around which the American initiative revolves: according to the British Financial Times last night, the Russian president would be ready to freeze the current front line, blocking the invasion of Ukraine and taking a step back from the claim to fully conquer the four Ukrainian regions partially occupied by the Russians, but already annexed to the Federation.

The British newspaper's sources trace Putin's 'offer' back to his last meeting with Steve Witkoff, Trump's envoy who, according to Kremlin advisor Jurij Ushakov, is already on his way back to Russia these days. On this basis, American diplomacy is trying to speed up, cornered by the impatience of Donald Trump who on Easter Day had seen "a good chance" of reaching an agreement already within this week. But as Peskov told FT, 'the work is complex and cannot be done in public. It is difficult to expect immediate results'.

This is confirmed by the fact that on Wednesday in London Rubio was supposed to reinvigorate the rapprochement of European diplomacy by meeting with the foreign ministers and national security advisors of the UK, France, Germany and Ukraine, following last week's meeting in Paris that had hinted at a certain optimism on the part of the French organisers. But last night Rubio's spokeswoman Tammy Bruce surprisingly announced that the US Secretary of State had cancelled the trip. The meeting, Bruce said, will go on as planned, with Ukraine envoy Keith Kellogg representing the US.

The fear of the Europeans, writes Financial Times, is that Putin will convince Trump to impose all Russian demands on Kiev as a fait accompli. Rumours about the White House plan circulated in recent days speak of a possible recognition of Russian control over Crimea by the US, and an American willingness to ease sanctions against Moscow, excluding the possibility of Ukrainian membership in NATO. To this the New York Post added other details: the 'Trump plan' would envisage the deployment in Ukraine - but not on the front line - of a contingent of European countries with a 'stabilising' role to respond to the demand for security guarantees to which Ukraine, as Rubio said, 'is as entitled as any country in the world'. The observance of the ceasefire, on the other hand, would be monitored by a commission financed by the United States and composed of Russian, Ukrainian, and third country representatives who are not members of NATO.