KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — The United States is offering Ukraine security guarantees for a period of 15 years as part of a proposed peace plan, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Monday, though he said he would prefer an American commitment of up to 50 years to deter Russia from further attempts to seize its neighbor’s land by force.

U.S. President Donald Trump hosted Zelenskyy at his Florida resort on Sunday and insisted that Ukraine and Russia are “closer than ever before” to a peace settlement.

Negotiators are still searching for a breakthrough on key issues, however, including whose forces withdraw from where in Ukraine and the fate of Ukraine’s Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, one of the 10 biggest in the world. Trump noted that the monthslong U.S.-led negotiations could still collapse.

“Without security guarantees, realistically, this war will not end,” Zelenskyy told reporters in voice messages responding to questions sent via a WhatsApp chat.

Ukraine has been fighting Russia since 2014, when it illegally annexed Crimea and Moscow-backed separatists took up arms in the Donbas, a vital industrial region in eastern Ukraine.

Details of the security guarantees have not become public but Zelenskyy said Monday they include how a peace deal would be monitored as well as the “presence” of partners. He didn’t elaborate, but Russia has said it won’t accept the deployment in Ukraine of troops from NATO countries.

As indications suggest negotiations could come to a head in January, before the fourth anniversary of Russia’s full-blown invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24, 2022, Russian President Vladimir Putin on Monday claimed that Russian troops are advancing in the eastern Donetsk region of Ukraine and are also pressing their offensive in the southern Zaporizhzhia region.

Putin has sought to portray himself as negotiating from a position of strength as Ukrainian forces strain to keep back the bigger Russian army.

He also emphasized at a meeting with senior military officers the need to create military buffer zones along the Russian border. “This is a very important task as it ensures the security of Russia’s border regions,” Putin said.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Monday that Putin and Trump were expected to speak in the near future but there was no indication the Russian leader would speak to Zelenskyy.

French President Emmanuel Macron said Kyiv’s allies will meet in Paris in early January to “finalize each country’s concrete contributions” to the security guarantees.

Trump said he would consider extending U.S. security guarantees for Ukraine beyond 15 years, according to Zelenskyy. The guarantees would be approved by the U.S. Congress as well as by parliaments in other countries involved in overseeing any settlement, he said.

Zelenskyy said he wants the 20-point peace plan under discussion to be approved by Ukrainians in a national referendum.

However, holding a ballot requires a ceasefire of at least 60 days, and Moscow has shown no willingness for a truce without a full settlement.

On the snowy streets of Kyiv, the Ukrainian capital, people were skeptical about the chances of peace.

One military veteran who uses the call sign Sensei, in keeping with the rules of the Ukrainian military, said Putin’s record in power shows he can’t be trusted. Sensei joined the military in 2022 and was wounded that year during the battle for the Ukrainian city of Bakhmut. Now, he said, almost nobody from his company is still alive.

“But all these sacrifices, they are not in vain, because we need to prove … that we exist, that we are, that we have the right to our existence, to our territory, to our culture, to our language,” the 65-year-old told The Associated Press.

Denys Shpylovyi, a 20-year-old student who was home for the holidays, said Trump’s willingness to accept Putin’s arguments has put Zelenskyy in a difficult situation.

“But I’m thankful for some progress. They are speaking, and maybe someday there will be hope,” he said.

Oleh Saakian, a Ukrainian political scientist, said it was a good sign that the Zelenskyy is managing to build a relationship with Trump, although he noted that “nothing has been adopted yet, nothing has been signed yet.”

“I don’t see these negotiations bringing us closer to real peace, because they are based on equality between the aggressor and the victim, they are based on complete disregard for international law, and … disregard for European security,” he said.

Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said that Ukraine launched an attack on Putin’s residence in the northwestern Novgorod region overnight from Sunday to Monday using 91 long-range drones.

Zelennskyy said the claim was “another lie” and came about because Moscow is unnerved by progress in peace efforts.

Lavrov said all the drones were destroyed and there were no casualties or damage. He didn’t say whether Putin was at his residence at the time. He said that Russia already has designated “the timing and facilities” for a retaliatory strike but didn’t elaborate.

Associated Press journalists Vasilisa Stepanenko and Volodymr Yurchuk in Kyiv, Ukraine contributed to this report.

Follow AP’s coverage of the war in Ukraine at https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine

KYIV, Dec 29 (Reuters) – Russia and Ukraine on Monday remained far apart on territorial issues that are blocking a peace deal, despite progress on security guarantees for Kyiv at talks between U.S. President Donald Trump and Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

Trump said after his talks with the Ukrainian president on Sunday that they were “getting a lot closer, maybe very close” to an agreement to end Russia’s war in Ukraine but that “thorny issues” were still there.

Zelenskyy said two main issues outlined in a 20-point peace proposal remained to be resolved — control of Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia nuclear power station, which is in Russian hands, and the fate of the Donbas area of eastern Ukraine.

“Two questions remain: the station – how will the station operate? – and the territory,” Zelenskyy told reporters on Monday.

Underlining how far apart Kyiv and Moscow are on territory, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Ukraine must withdraw its troops from the small part of Donbas that it still controls, and that Kyiv would lose more land if it did not agree to a deal.

“We are talking about the withdrawal of the regime’s armed forces from the Donbas,” Peskov said.

He said a call was planned soon between Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin, but did not say when.

Trump’s decision to hold talks with Zelenskyy in Florida on Sunday had widely raised hopes of at least some progress being made towards ending what has become Europe’s deadliest conflict since World War II.

Russia controls about a fifth of Ukraine, including the Crimean peninsula, which it annexed in 2014. It claims Donbas – comprising the Donetsk and Luhansk regions – as well as the Zaporizhzhia and Kherson regions, although they are all internationally recognised as Ukraine’s sovereign territory.

Russia wants Kyiv to withdraw troops from parts of the Donetsk region it has failed to occupy in four years of war since its invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. Kyiv wants fighting halted along current front lines, and Washington has proposed a free economic zone if Ukraine pulls troops back.

“There is no detailed concept for a free economic zone yet,” Zelenskyy said.

Russia has rejected the idea of a ceasefire to allow a referendum to be held on any territorial concessions by Ukraine.

One sign of progress on Sunday came when Zelenskyy said a bilateral agreement had been reached on security guarantees for Kyiv, although Trump said they were only 95% ready.

“I told (Trump) that we have been at war for almost 15 years, and would very much like the guarantees to be for longer,” Zelenskyy said, adding that he had asked Trump to consider a security deal for up to 50 years.

Trump said on Sunday he expected European countries to “take over a big part” of that effort with U.S. backing. Agreement on such moves could be complicated as Russia has said any foreign troop deployment in Ukraine would be unacceptable.

French President Emmanuel Macron said progress was being made on security guarantees, and countries in the so-called “Coalition of the Willing” would meet in Paris in early January to “finalise concrete contributions”.

Despite the recent peace overtures and some exchanges of prisoners of war, mistrust runs deep between Ukraine and Russia.

Russia launched a heavy attack on Ukraine before the talks in Florida began, and has stepped up attacks on Ukraine’s energy facilities as winter approached. Large parts of the capital Kyiv were without power on Monday after the strike as temperatures were below freezing.

Trump repeated on Sunday after his call with Putin that he believed the Russian leader wants the war to end.

“In my opinion, (Putin’s) actions do not coincide with the seemingly peaceful rhetoric he uses in his dialogue with the U.S. president,” Zelenskyy said, questioning Putin’s commitment to peace.

Zelenskiy said he was open to any format of communication with Russia, and a meeting would be possible after Trump and European leaders agree on the framework for peace. Peskov said no call between Putin and Zelenskiy was being discussed.

Putin has said Russia will achieve its aims in Ukraine by force if Kyiv does not want to resolve the conflict diplomatically – making clear it must accept Moscow’s demands.

Several Ukrainians who spoke to Reuters in Kyiv on Monday voiced scepticism about prospects for a lasting peace.

“Putin doesn’t need territory; he doesn’t need Donbas — he wants to destroy the Ukrainians. He destroys us as a nation,” said Nadiia Yevtushenko, a 57-year-old Kyiv resident.

(Additional reporting by Moscow newsroom, Olena Harmash, Yurii Kovalenko and Andrii Pryimachenko in Kyiv, Andrea Shalal in Palm Beach, Florida, and Gram Slattery in Washington, Writing by Timothy Heritage, Editing by Alexandra Hudson)

PALM BEACH, Fla. (AP) — President Donald Trump said Sunday he believes both Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Russian President Vladimir Putin truly want peace, as he welcomed the “brave” Ukrainian leader for talks at his Florida resort.

“The two leaders want it to end,” Trump said at the outset of the meeting at Mar-a-Lago. Before Zelenskyy arrived, Trump spoke with Putin by phone for more than an hour, and planned to speak with him again soon after.

Greeting Zelenskyy at Mar-a-Lago, Trump said of him: “This gentleman has worked very hard, and is very brave, and his people are very brave.”

Zelenskyy, by Trump’s side, said he’d discuss issues of territorial concessions with Trump, which have so far been a red line for his country. He said his negotiators and Trump’s “have discussed how to move step by step and bring peace closer” and would continue to do so in the meeting.

Russia intensified its attacks on Ukraine’s capital in the days before the meeting.

Putin’s foreign affairs adviser Yuri Ushakov, said the Trump-Putin call was initiated by the U.S. side, lasted over an hour, and was “friendly, benevolent, and businesslike.” Ushakov said Trump and Putin agreed to speak again “promptly” after Trump’s meeting with Zelenskyy.

But Ushakov added that a “bold, responsible, political decision is needed from Kyiv” on the fiercely contested Donbas region in eastern Ukraine and other matters in dispute for there to be a “complete cessation” of hostilities.

In overnight developments, three guided aerial bombs launched by Russia struck private homes in the eastern city of Sloviansk, according to the head of the local military administration, Vadym Lakh. Three people were injured and one man died, Lakh said in a post on the Telegram messenger app.

The strike came the day after Russia attacked Ukraine’s capital with ballistic missiles and drones on Saturday, killing at least one person and wounding 27, a day before planned talks between the leaders of Ukraine and the United States, Ukrainian authorities said. Explosions boomed across Kyiv as the attack began in the early morning and continued for hours. Trump said, however, that he still believes Putin is “very serious” about ending the war.

“I believe Ukraine has made some very strong attacks also,” Trump told reporters as Zelenskyy stood by his side. “And I don’t say that negatively. I think, you probably have to. I don’t say that negatively. But I think, he hasn’t told me that, but there have been some explosions in various parts of Russia. It looks to me, like, I don’t know. I don’t think it came from the Congo.”

Trump said he’d call Putin after the meeting with Zelenskyy and also reach out to European leaders who he said “have been really great.” He tempered his optimism about ending the conflict, however.

“It’ll either end or it’s going to go on for a long time and millions of additional people will be killed,” Trump said.

Trump and Zelenskyy sitting down face-to-face underscored the apparent progress made by Trump’s top negotiators in recent weeks as the sides traded draft peace plans and continued to shape a proposal to end the fighting. Zelenskyy told reporters Friday that the 20-point draft proposal negotiators have discussed is “about 90% ready” — echoing a figure, and the optimism, that U.S. officials conveyed when Trump’s chief negotiators met with Zelenskyy in Berlin earlier this month.

During the recent talks, the U.S. agreed to offer certain security guarantees to Ukraine similar to those offered to other members of NATO. The proposal came as Zelenskyy said he was prepared to drop his country’s bid to join the security alliance if Ukraine received NATO-like protection that would be designed to safeguard it against future Russian attacks.

Zelenskyy also spoke on Christmas Day with U.S. special envoy Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law. The Ukrainian leader said they discussed “certain substantive details” and cautioned “there is still work to be done on sensitive issues” and “the weeks ahead may also be intensive.”

The U.S. president has been working to end the war in Ukraine for much of his first year back in office, showing irritation with both Zelenskyy and Putin while publicly acknowledging the difficulty of ending the conflict. Long gone are the days when, as a candidate in 2024, he boasted that he could resolve the fighting in a day.

After hosting Zelenskyy at the White House in October, Trump demanded that both Russia and Ukraine halt fighting and “stop at the battle line,” implying that Moscow should be able to keep the territory it has seized from Ukraine.

Zelenskyy said last week that he would be willing to withdraw troops from Ukraine’s eastern industrial heartland as part of a plan to end the war, if Russia also pulls back and the area becomes a demilitarized zone monitored by international forces.

Putin has publicly said he wants all the areas in four key regions that have been captured by his forces, as well as the Crimean Peninsula, illegally annexed in 2014, to be recognized as Russian territory. He also has insisted that Ukraine withdraw from some areas in eastern Ukraine that Moscow’s forces haven’t captured. Kyiv has publicly rejected all those demands.

The Kremlin also wants Ukraine to abandon its bid to join NATO. It warned that it wouldn’t accept the deployment of any troops from members of the military alliance and would view them as a “legitimate target.”

Putin also has said Ukraine must limit the size of its army and give official status to the Russian language, demands he has made from the outset of the conflict.

Putin’s foreign affairs adviser, Yuri Ushakov, told the business daily Kommersant this month that Russian police and national guard would stay in parts of Donetsk – one of the two major areas, along with Luhansk, that make up the Donbas region — even if they become a demilitarized zone under a prospective peace plan.

Ushakov cautioned that trying to reach a compromise could take a long time. He said U.S. proposals that took into account Russian demands had been “worsened” by alterations proposed by Ukraine and its European allies.

Trump has been somewhat receptive to Putin’s demands, making the case that the Russian president can be persuaded to end the war if Kyiv agrees to cede Ukrainian land in the Donbas region and if Western powers offer economic incentives to bring Russia back into the global economy.

Kim reported from Washington and Morton from London. Associated Press writers Illia Novikov in Kyiv, Nicholas Riccardi in Denver and Darlene Superville in Washington contributed to this report.

KYIV, Dec 25 (Reuters) – Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on Thursday that he spoke with U.S. President Donald Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff and son-in-law Jared Kushner for about an hour on how to end the war with Russia.

“It was a really good conversation: many details, good ideas, that we discussed. There are some new ideas on how to bring the real peace closer, and it concerns formats, meetings, and, certainly, the timeline,” Zelenskyy said on the Telegram app.

Trump has been pushing for a deal to end the almost four-year-long war, and in recent weeks peace efforts led by Witkoff and Kushner have been slowly inching forward.

Earlier this week, Zelenskyy presented a 20-point draft peace plan that he described as the main framework for ending the war.

The draft represented a slimmed-down version of an original 28-point plan the U.S. previously discussed with the Russian side that was widely seen as mainly benefiting Moscow as it demanded Kyiv cede territory and put curbs on its army.

However, key territorial questions remain unresolved in the new 20-point draft, Zelenskyy said, adding that a meeting with Trump would be required to solve the most sensitive issues.

Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said on Thursday that Moscow was analysing the documents on ending the war which were brought to Moscow by Russia’s special envoy Kirill Dmitriev from the United States.

The White House did not immediately reply to a request for comment.

Zelenskyy said that Ukraine’s top negotiator Rustem Umerov planned to have one more conversation with the U.S. negotiators later in the day.

“We are truly working 24/7 to bring closer the end of this brutal Russian war against Ukraine and to ensure that all documents and steps are realistic, effective, and reliable,” he said.

(Reporting by Olena Harmash; editing by Barbara Lewis)