Vice President JD Vance said the U.S. has issued a “very explicit proposal” to Russia and Ukraine on a path forward to a peace deal, adding “it’s time for them to either say yes or for the United States to walk away from this process.”

“The current lines, somewhere close to them is where you’re ultimately, I think, going to draw the new lines in the conflict,” Vance told reporters in India on Wednesday, after finishing a tour of the Taj Mahal. He added that doing so would mean both Ukraine and Russia would have to give up some territory each side currently controls.

Vance made his comments as talks planned in London on Wednesday between top officials from the U.S., Ukraine and major European powers were downgraded to technical-level meetings after U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio postponed his visit — and as President Donald Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff travels to Moscow. Washington shared its proposals with Kyiv and European allies during a gathering last week in Paris.

The chief of staff of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, Andriy Yermak, signaled on arrival in London that Kyiv would push forward with talks. A “full and unconditional ceasefire” would be a first step toward a “full-fledged settlement process and achieving a just and sustainable peace,” he said in a Telegram post.

Freezing the conflict along existing battle lines would be a far greater sacrifice for Ukraine, which has sought to regain all territory in the country’s east and south seized by Russia since 2014, including Crimea, and following the full-scale invasion that began in February 2022.

The U.S. is prepared to recognize Russia’s control over the Ukrainian Black Sea peninsula and to ease sanctions on Moscow as part of a potential peace deal, Bloomberg reported previously. Zelenskyy said on Tuesday that his country won’t recognize Russia’s occupation of Crimea, which is internationally recognized as Ukrainian territory.

“There’s going to have to be some territorial swaps,” Vance said. While the border may not wind up reflecting the front lines as they stand now, in order to stop the bloodshed, both sides need to “put down their weapons, to freeze this thing and to get on with the business of actually building a better Russia and a better Ukraine,” he said.

Trump warned last week that he would walk away from efforts to end the war in Ukraine if a deal can’t be reached soon. Witkoff, his envoy, will travel to Russia later in the week after visiting President Vladimir Putin three times already since the inauguration and describing his most recent meeting as “compelling.”

Vance said he was “optimistic” about the talks, adding that he sees all sides as having negotiated in good faith so far.

Yermak arrived in London with Ukrainian Defense Minister Rustem Umerov and Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha, who are also meeting British Foreign Secretary David Lammy and U.K. Defense Secretary John Healey.

Zelenskyy said Tuesday that he would aim to meet Trump at the Vatican on Saturday, where global leaders will attend the funeral of Pope Francis. He said his team would be ready to discuss an “unconditional ceasefire or partial ceasefire” during the London talks.

Russia welcomes the U.S. “mediation efforts,” though many details of a settlement still need to be discussed and work is continuing, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Wednesday, according to the state-run Tass news service. While there are no contacts now with Ukraine or Europe, Putin is open to them in the interests of reaching a settlement, Peskov said.

Moscow has stepped up attacks on Ukrainian civilian infrastructure, killing more than 60 people this month in strikes including those in the northern city of Sumy and Kryvyi Rih in central Ukraine.

Russian drones killed at least nine civilians and wounded dozens in a bus early Wednesday as people headed to work in Marhanets in the central Dnipropetrovsk region, according to local authorities.

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