US President Donald Trump said Russia and Ukraine are “very close to a deal” that would end their three-year war, after his envoy met with President Vladimir Putin on Friday in talks Moscow said were “constructive and very useful.

Russian President Vladimir Putin announced Monday a three-day cease-fire in its war with Ukraine is set to take place in May, but Ukrainian officials question its timing and validity.

Washington-brokered negotiations to end Russia’s war in Ukraine have largely boiled down to a diamond-shaped peninsula about the size of Massachusetts.

Amid reports that a U.S. peace proposal might include recognizing Moscow's illegal annexation of Crimea, President Donald Trump denied Ukraine was being pressured to accept the move — while also asserting Ukraine had given up the peninsula in 2014 "without firing a shot.

The Russian Federation demands to recognize Crimea as part of its territory in order to disrupt negotiations on ending the full-scale war, said Borys Babin, an expert from the “Reintegration of Crimea” Association in the material by RBC-Ukraine "Trump changing the game: Why Crimea suddenly came up in peace talks".