Trump’s Crimea trap: why the US wants Ukraine’s "consent" to call the peninsula Russian

According to leaks shared with US media, the first item in Trump’s one-page outline of the peace proposal is a suggestion for the US to recognise Crimea as "Russian" de jure. These reports emphasise that the US does not require Ukraine (or perhaps even EU states) to follow suit — Kyiv would retain its official stance recognising Crimea within its constitutional borders.

Trump himself wrote on Truth Social: "Nobody is asking Zelenskyy to recognise Crimea as Russian territory." His spokesperson, Karoline Leavitt, later reinforced this message during a press briefing at the White House.

At first glance, this might not seem like a major issue. Even European Pravda suggests it could be a "compromise" acceptable to both Russia and EU states, who also wouldn’t be asked to formally recognise the annexation.

So should Ukraine consider agreeing to it? Could it even present this move as a goodwill gesture for the sake of peace? After all, the US could legally recognise Crimea as Russian even without Ukraine’s consent — so what would be lost?

In fact, this could be a very dangerous trap.

Why would the US need Ukraine’s agreement in the first place?

The answer becomes clearer when you consider the next steps: Ukraine’s consent could be crucial in legitimising and securing international approval of the entire "peace package," potentially undermining Ukraine’s internationally recognised borders.

This is likely the Kremlin’s goal in advancing this proposal through Trump’s adviser Witkoff: gaining a Ukrainian stamp of approval, however symbolic, to later present the deal, like the Minsk agreements once were, for formal endorsement by the UN Security Council.

If that happens, the agreement could include a clause recognising Crimea as Russian under US law. Then, as permanent Security Council members, the US and Russia could urge the rest of the world to support the "peace," arguing that Ukraine has already accepted the package, including the wording on Crimea.

And after that, based on a UN Security Council resolution, Russia and the US could both claim that Crimea is part of Russia’s internationally recognised borders.

Of course, Ukraine would reject this and insist on its interpretation based on its Constitution and international documents such as previous UN General Assembly resolutions that explicitly affirm Crimea as part of Ukraine.

But at that point, it would no longer be clear whose position would carry more weight.

Currently, even Moscow’s close allies like Iran or China do not officially recognise Crimea as Russian. However, if a precedent is set by the United States — through a Security Council-blessed peace deal that Ukraine itself agreed to — the number of countries willing to follow suit could grow significantly.

Russia would likely sweeten the deal for these countries with economic incentives while pressuring the US administration (which would, in turn, pressure others) to keep up the "peace-first" narrative and promote recognition of Crimea as Russian.

Ukraine would likely continue to enjoy strong support from European nations, where the principle of territorial integrity is a deeply rooted pillar of international law — enshrined in the Helsinki Final Act of the 1975 Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe.

But on a global scale, the picture is less clear.

For example, the UN Charter emphasises peaceful settlement of disputes but does not explicitly enshrine the inviolability of borders as a foundational principle (Article 2 of the Charter). And since the UN’s founding, numerous changes in state borders have taken place, including through decolonisation.

There are also several unresolved territorial disputes where no clear international consensus exists — like the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the India-Pakistan conflict over Kashmir, and Morocco’s occupation of Western Sahara.

A closer parallel for Ukraine is Kosovo.

Yet unlike all these cases, the Russia-Ukraine conflict is not even considered a territorial dispute under international law — because Ukraine’s borders are clearly defined and internationally recognized by all UN member states, including Russia in 1991, and have not been contested by anyone but Moscow.

But if Ukraine agrees to "permit" the US to recognise Russia’s annexation of Crimea, the number of countries that might accept Ukraine’s borders under this new "US-Russia interpretation" could become comparable to — or even exceed — the number that continues to support the Ukraine-EU position.

This would blur the concept of Ukraine’s internationally recognised borders — the very foundation of its legal argument on the world stage.

After all, international recognition of a state’s borders by other states carries more weight in international law than what is written in its Constitution.

And here lies the cunning twist: both the US and Moscow understand that Ukraine will never recognise Crimea as Russian and will never amend its Constitution to say otherwise.

But together, the US and Russia could redefine Ukraine’s borders on the international stage — without Crimea — if Ukraine gives even a symbolic green light by "allowing" Washington to do what it could technically do anyway, even without Ukraine's consent.

That’s why this so-called permission from Kyiv could turn out to be a massive strategic mistake, perhaps no less grave than the Budapest Memorandum.

So what should be done? Ukraine must defend its red lines.

Specifically, while Ukraine may accept, under certain conditions, the temporary loss of control over the currently occupied territories, it must never agree to the legal recognition of their annexation, including Crimea.

That also means refusing to accept or endorse any recognition of such annexation by other states.

Yes, the US or others could still act independently and recognise the annexation without Ukraine’s agreement, as they technically could today. But in that case, Ukraine would retain stronger legal and moral grounds to argue that such steps contradict the unified international recognition of its borders.

Therefore, if any compromises are to be made in the text of a future peace deal, it must exclude any provision concerning the legal status of Crimea.

Publications in the Expert Opinion section are not editorial articles and solely reflect the author's point of view