Outline emerges of Putin's offer to end his war in Ukraine

By Tom Balmforth

LONDON (Reuters) -Russia would relinquish tiny pockets of occupied Ukraine and Kyiv would cede swathes of its eastern land which Moscow has been unable to capture, under peace proposals discussed by Russia's Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump at their Alaska summit, sources briefed on Moscow's thinking said.

The account emerged the day after Trump and Putin met at an airforce base in Alaska, the first encounter between a U.S. president and the Kremlin chief since before the start of the Ukraine conflict.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy is due to travel to Washington on Monday to discuss with Trump a possible settlement of the full-scale war, which Putin launched in February 2022.

Although the summit failed to secure the ceasefire he said he had wanted, Trump said in an interview with Fox News' Sean Hannity that he and Putin had discussed land transfers and security guarantees for Ukraine, and had "largely agreed".

"I think we're pretty close to a deal," he said, adding: "Ukraine has to agree to it. Maybe they'll say 'no'."

The two sources, who requested anonymity to discuss sensitive matters, said their knowledge of Putin's proposals was mostly based on discussions between leaders in Europe, the U.S. and Ukraine, and noted it was not complete.

Trump briefed Zelenskiy and European leaders on his summit discussions early on Saturday.

It was not immediately clear if the proposals by Putin were an opening gambit to serve as a starting point for negotiations or more like a final offer that was not subject to discussion.

UKRAINIAN LAND FOR PEACE

At face value, at least some of the demands would present huge challenges for Ukraine's leadership to accept.

Putin's offer ruled out a ceasefire until a comprehensive deal is reached, blocking a key demand of Zelenskiy, whose country is hit daily by Russian drones and ballistic missiles.

Under the proposed Russian deal, Kyiv would fully withdraw from the eastern Donetsk and Luhansk regions in return for a Russian pledge to freeze the front lines in the southern regions of Kherson and Zaporizhzhia, the sources said.

Ukraine has already rejected any retreat from Ukrainian land such as the Donetsk region, where its troops are dug in and which Kyiv says serves as a crucial defensive structure to prevent Russian attacks deeper into its territory.

Russia would be prepared to return comparatively small tracts of Ukrainian land it has occupied in the northern Sumy and northeastern Kharkiv regions, the sources said.

Russia holds pockets of the Sumy and Kharkiv regions that total around 440 square km, according to Ukraine's Deep State battlefield mapping project. Ukraine controls around 6,600 square km of Donbas, which comprises the Donetsk and Luhansk regions and is claimed by Russia.

Although the Americans have not spelled this out, the sources said they knew Russia's leader was also seeking - at the very least - formal recognition of Russian sovereignty over Crimea, which Moscow seized from Ukraine in 2014.

It was not clear if that meant recognition by the U.S. government or, for instance, all Western powers and Ukraine. Kyiv and its European allies reject formal recognition of Moscow's rule in the peninsula.

They said Putin would also expect the lifting of at least some of the array of sanctions on Russia. However, they could not say if this applied to U.S. as well as European sanctions.

Trump said on Friday he did not immediately need to consider retaliatory tariffs on countries such as China for buying Russian oil - which is subject to a range of Western sanctions - but might have to "in two or three weeks."

Ukraine would also be barred from joining the NATO military alliance, though Putin seemed to be open to Ukraine receiving some kind of security guarantees, the sources said.

However, they added that it was unclear what this meant in practice. European leaders said Trump had discussed security guarantees for Ukraine during their conversation on Saturday and also broached an idea for an "Article 5"-style guarantee outside the NATO military alliance.

NATO regards any attack launched on one of its 32 members as an attack on all under its Article 5 clause.

Joining the Atlantic alliance is a strategic objective for Kyiv that is enshrined in the country's constitution.

Russia would also demand official status for the Russian language inside parts of, or across, Ukraine, as well as the right of the Russian Orthodox Church to operate freely, the sources said.

Ukraine's security agency accuses the Moscow-linked church of abetting Russia's war on Ukraine by spreading pro-Russian propaganda and housing spies, something denied by the church which says it has cut canonical ties with Moscow.

Ukraine has passed a law banning Russia-linked religious organisations, of which it considers the church to be one. However, it has not yet started enforcing the ban.

(Reporting by Tom Balmforth; Additional reporting by Gram Slattery and Trevor Hunnicutt; editing by Jon Boyle)