This just in:
A Back-Channel Plan for Ukraine and Russia, Courtesy of Trump Associates
A week before Michael T. Flynn resigned as national security adviser, a sealed proposal was hand-delivered to his office, outlining a way for President Trump to lift sanctions against Russia.
Mr. Flynn is gone, having been caught lying about his own discussion of sanctions with the Russian ambassador. But the proposal, a peace plan for Ukraine and Russia, remains, along with those pushing it: Michael D. Cohen, the president’s personal lawyer, who delivered the document; Felix H. Sater, a business associate who helped Mr. Trump scout deals in Russia; and a Ukrainian lawmaker trying to rise in a political opposition movement shaped in part by Mr. Trump’s former campaign manager Paul D. Manafort.
Andrii Artemenko is a Ukranian politician and Russia apologist who is seeking to take down the current President of that country. It's believed that Paul Manafort had a direct hand in putting together a group of opposition pols to oppose Poroshenko when he took power after Yanukovich fled to Russia in 2014. The Ukranian government is not amused by his extracurricular diplomacy, as can be imagined.
He was at the Republican convention in Cleveland last summer. It's not known with whom he met.
He claims that his "peace plan" has the encouragement of the Kremlin, naturally.
Felix "Margarita Glass" Sater is a business associate of Trump from Russia who, in all likelihood, is also mobbed up. Through Bayrock Group, he was deeply involved with the Trump SoHo project. He's one of the many creepy denizens of Trump Tower and at one time was a "senior adviser" in Trump Org.
Michael D Cohen, it was reported a couple of weeks ago, is one of the Trump associates whom the FBI are scutinising, including looking at past telephone, travel, and financial records. He's named in the Steele Dossier. It's important to note that he's alleged only to have delivered this proposal to the White House.
Apparently, Artemenko contacted Sater, who brought in Cohen for a meeting in Manhattan in late January.
Artemenko's proposal apparently involves allegations of fraud of the current government in Ukraine. Presumably, Poroshenko would need to be removed in order for this to have a chance of advancing. That would almost certainly be well received by the so-called president. From January:
Ukrainian efforts to sabotage Trump backfire
A Ukrainian-American operative who was consulting for the Democratic National Committee met with top officials in the Ukrainian Embassy in Washington in an effort to expose ties between Trump, top campaign aide Paul Manafort and Russia, according to people with direct knowledge of the situation.
The Ukrainian efforts had an impact in the race, helping to force Manafort’s resignation and advancing the narrative that Trump’s campaign was deeply connected to Ukraine’s foe to the east, Russia. But they were far less concerted or centrally directed than Russia’s alleged hacking and dissemination of Democratic emails.
So that happened.