US Presidential Special Envoy Says Ukraine Peace Deal Is Near

Keith Kellogg. (Wikimedia Commons/JKTKMM)

JAKARTA - US President Donald Trump's special envoy to Ukraine is about to step down saying the deal to end Ukraine's war is "very close" and relies on solving only two main issues, but the Kremlin says there needs to be radical changes to some US proposals.

US Special Envoy for Ukraine Keith Kellogg, who will step down in January, told the Reagan National Defense Forum efforts to resolve the conflict were in the "last 10 meters" which he said were always the most difficult.

The two main issues that remain unresolved, said Kellogg, are over the region - especially the future of Donbas - and the future of Ukraine's Zaporizhia Nuclear Power Plant, Europe's largest PLTN, which is under Russian control.

"If the two issues can be resolved, I think other things will go pretty well," Kellogg said on the weekend.

"We're almost there," he continued.

"We are really very close," said Kellogg.

After President Vladimir Putin held four-hour Kremlin talks last week with Presidential Special Envoy Steve Witkoff, and President Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner last week, Russian Presidential Foreign Policy Aide Yuri Ushakov said "territorial issues" had been discussed.

That is a short Kremlin term for Russia's claim to the entire Donbas, although Ukraine still controls at least 5,000 square km (1,900 square miles) of the region. Almost all countries recognize Donbas as part of Ukraine.

On the other hand, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said handing over the remaining Donetsk would be illegal without a referendum and would give Russia a platform to launch further attacks on Ukraine in the future.

Ushakov, quoted by Russian media on Sunday, said the United States should "make serious changes, arguably radical in their documents" about Ukraine. He did not explain what Moscow wanted from Washington.

Kellogg, a retired lieutenant general on duty in Vietnam, Panama, and Iraq, said the scale of death and injury caused by the Ukraine war was "terrible" and had never happened before in terms of regional warfare.

He explained that both sides had suffered more than 2 million victims, including the death and injuries since the war began. Neither Russia nor Ukraine disclosed estimates of their credible losses.

Russia currently controls 19.2 percent of Ukraine, including Crimea, which it annexed in 2014, the entire Luhansk, more than 80 percent Donetsk, about 75 percent Kherson and Zaporizhzhia, as well as a small part of Kharkiv, Sumy, Mykolaiv and Dniprop Barissk.

President Trump said ending Europe's deadliest conflict since World War II has so far been the most difficult overseas policy goal of his presidency.

Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022 after eight years of fighting between Russian-backed separatists and Ukrainian forces in Donbas, consisting of Donetsk and Luhansk.