Following the peace talks in Geneva, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio has said that significant progress was achieved on Sunday 23 November, while noting that he "haven't seen" any proposals from European representatives, even though a meeting had taken place with national security advisers from European countries.

Source : Rubio at the second briefing following the talks, aired by Ukrainian public broadcaster Suspilne

Quote : "We arrived here today with one goal, and the goal was to take what – it's 28 points or 26 points, depending on which version as it continued to evolve, and try to narrow the ones that were open items. And we have achieved that today in a very substantial way. Now, obviously, like any final agreement, it'll have to be agreed upon by the presidents, and there are a couple issues that we need to continue to work on. I think today was worthwhile, it was probably the most productive day we have had on this issue, maybe in the entirety of our engagement, but certainly in a very long time."

Details : Rubio declined to comment on specific points of the plan.

"I'm not going to speculate or go into the details of any of the specific items in the latest version of the proposal because, frankly, by tomorrow or the next day, that may have evolved and changed further. But I can tell you, I guess, that I feel very optimistic that we can get something done here because we made a tremendous amount of progress today," he added.

Rubio said that the peace process had been launched already understanding Russia's position.

"No matter what we came up with today, obviously we now have to take what we come up with, if we can reach that agreement with the Ukrainian side, to the Russian side. That's another part of this equation. They have to agree to this in order for it to work," he added.

Responding to a question about deadlines for approving an agreement, Rubio said: "The deadline is we want to get this done as soon as possible."

"Obviously, we'd love it to be Thursday. We'd love to – ultimately, the important point today is that we have made substantial progress. We've really moved forward.So I feel very optimistic that we're going to get there in a very reasonable period of time, very soon. Whether it's Thursday, whether it's Friday, whether it's Wednesday, whether it's Monday of the following week... Our goal is to end this war as soon as possible, but we need a little more time," he added.

Asked whether consultations had taken place with representatives of European countries, Rubio said: "Yeah, we met with the national security advisers of a variety of countries that were here, and we sort of walked them through the progress we had made today. We didn't go in, again, to tremendous detail. We assured them that items that involve both Europe and NATO directly — that those items are items that we sort of agreed to put as part of a separate track because it involves input from them. But I think what they heard, and I hope they'll confirm, I believe they will, is an incredible amount of positivity from both the Ukrainian and American side about the progress we've made today."

Meanwhile, when asked about the counterproposals from European representatives that had been published in the media, Rubio said: "I haven't seen any counterplan."

Background :

• Following reports from the Ukrainian delegation at negotiations in Geneva, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that the US proposals might incorporate a number of elements reflecting Ukrainian perspectives that are vital to its national interests.
• Rustem Umierov, Secretary of the National Security and Defence Council of Ukraine (NSDC) and a member of Ukraine's delegation at the negotiations in Geneva, said that the current draft of the "peace plan" already reflects most of Ukraine's key priorities.
• Andrii Yermak, leader of Ukraine's negotiating team and Head of the President's Office, announced the completion of the first round of talks with the US delegation in Geneva, calling the session "very productive". He also said a second meeting would take place on Sunday with European partners.
• The United Kingdom, Germany and France have prepared counter-proposals to the 28-point US "peace plan", including a cap of 800,000 personnel for Ukraine's Armed Forces and negotiations to start from the current line of contact. The full text has been released by Reuters.
• Zelenskyy said that talks on the "peace plan" in Geneva would continue virtually until nightfall.

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