Trump official denies claims Ukraine peace plan was 'written in Russia'
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio has been forced to deny claims that Donald Trump’s peace plan is Russia’s ‘wish list’.
A group of US senators who are critical of the plan to end the Russia-Ukraine war have claimed that Rubio told them that it is not actually Washington’s views on the conflict.
Instead, they said that Rubio told them Trump is pushing Ukraine to accept a ‘wish list’ of the Russians.
Senators have claimed that Marco Rubio told them that the plan is Russia’s ‘wish list’. Pic: Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images
A State Department spokesperson denied these claims and called them ‘blatantly false’.
Rubio himself then took to social media to suggest that the US senators were mistaken, even though they named him as their source for the information.
Rubio insisted that the US wrote the proposal that has drawn criticism from many for being so favourable to Russia.
The plan has been criticised for being very favourable to Russia. Pic: ALEXANDER KAZAKOV/POOL/AFP via Getty Images
The White House claims that the widely leaked 28-point US-backed peace plan is the result of a month of work between Rubio, Trump and Steve Witkoff.
They also say it had input from both Ukrainians and Russians.
However, the plan wants Ukraine to give up large areas of territory to Russia, as well as agreeing with many of Moscow’s other demands that Volodymyr Zelenskyy has wholeheartedly rejected on a number of occasions.
Volodymyr Zelenskyy has rejected demands in the plan on a number of occasions. Pic: Mert Gokhankoc/dia images via Getty Images
Trump has said that he wants Ukraine to accept the plan by late next week.
Republican Senator Mike Rounds told a security conference in Canada: ‘This administration was not responsible for this release in its current form. They want to utilise it as a starting point.’
He added that ‘it looked more like it was written in Russian to begin with’.
The group of senators who claimed that Rubio revealed the shocking information to them say that he had contacted some of them while on his way to Geneva for talks on the plan.
Senator Angus King claimed that Rubio told them the plan ‘was not the administration’s plan’ but a ‘wish list of the Russians’.
King added: ‘It rewards aggression. This is pure and simple. There’s no ethical, legal, moral, political justification for Russia claiming eastern Ukraine.’
Meanwhile, Vladimir Putin has welcomed the proposal.
He said it ‘could form the basis of a final peace settlement’ if the US can get Ukraine and other European allies to agree to it.
