Global & US Headlines
Kyiv–Washington Launch Three-Track Peace Package Talks
On 10 Dec 2025 Zelensky opened the first joint session with U.S. envoys to turn a revised 20-point cease-fire outline into an integrated trio of agreements on peace terms, security guarantees, and post-war reconstruction, starting a sprint toward a Christmas deadline pushed by Washington.
Focusing Facts
- Zelensky, Treasury Sec. Scott Bessent, Jared Kushner, and BlackRock CEO Larry Fink held a video meeting on 10 Dec 2025 that inaugurated the working group drafting the economic recovery pact.
- Kyiv confirmed the negotiation of three distinct documents: a 20-point framework for ending the war, a U.S.–EU security-guarantee treaty, and an economic reconstruction plan leveraging frozen Russian assets.
- Drafts circulating among negotiators envision an EU accession date for Ukraine in 2027 and a Korea-style demilitarized zone along the present front line.
Context
Great-power wars often stall into armistice diplomacy: the 1953 Korean Armistice froze lines and birthed a DMZ still patrolled seven decades later, while the 1948 Marshall Plan framed Europe’s recovery as a bulwark against Soviet power. The current three-track package echoes both precedents—aiming to lock in borders de facto, graft U.S. security guarantees outside formal NATO structures, and mobilize private capital for reconstruction. It also revives a 19th-century pattern whereby financiers (today BlackRock, yesterday the Rothschilds underwriting post-Crimean War railways) shape the peace terms they later bankroll. Whether this moment proves pivotal on a 100-year timescale hinges on two uncertainties: Russia’s acceptance of a frozen conflict that leaves Kyiv drifting West, and the credibility of U.S. guarantees amid its own election cycles. If the accords hold, they could become a model for marrying military off-ramps with investment carrots; if they fail, they may simply punctuate a pause before a longer war, as Versailles did in 1919.
Perspectives
Ukrainian government-aligned and broadly pro-Ukraine outlets
Ukrinform, KyivPost, etc. — They depict Zelensky’s evolving 20-point framework and the two follow-on documents as a practical, momentum-building pathway to a just peace, security guarantees and a Europe-backed reconstruction boom. By echoing Kyiv’s messaging they downplay how talks involve painful territorial compromises and present ongoing negotiations as almost entirely on Ukraine’s terms to sustain domestic morale and foreign aid.
Russian state-controlled media
RT — The coverage stresses that Western officials are quietly pushing a “Korean-style” deal requiring land swaps and a wide demilitarized zone, signalling that Kyiv will have to accept loss of Donbass territory. Framing the draft accord this way normalises Russia’s battlefield gains and portrays Ukraine as being forced to bend, while obscuring Moscow’s own maximalist pre-conditions.
US far-right commentary outlets hostile to Zelensky
InfoWars — They brand Zelensky a “dictator” who keeps refusing Trump’s magnanimous peace offer and is cynically focused on post-war money rather than ending the conflict. This narrative serves pro-Trump political messaging, vilifies Kyiv, and downplays Russian aggression, relying on incendiary language rather than verified detail.