Putin meets Trumps envoys Witkoff, Kushner as Kremlin says Ukraine settlement hinges on territory
Russian President Vladimir Putin discussed the settlement in Ukraine with US President Donald Trump’s envoys during marathon overnight talks, and the Kremlin insisted that the territorial issue needs to be resolved to reach a peace deal.The Kremlin meeting, which lasted past 3 a.m.Friday, came hours after Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky sharply criticized his European allies Thursday for what he cast as their slow and fragmented response to Russia’s nearly four-year full-scale invasion that he said has left Ukraine at the mercy of Putin amid an ongoing US push for a peace settlement.Kremlin foreign affairs adviser Yuri Ushakov, who participated in Putin’s meeting with Trump’s envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, said “it was reaffirmed that reaching a long-term settlement can’t be expected without solving the territorial issue,” a reference to Moscow’s demand that Kyiv withdraws its troops from the areas in the east that Russia illegally annexed but never fully captured.Zelensky said after meeting Thursday with Trump in Davos, Switzerland, that the future status of land in eastern Ukraine currently occupied by Russia is unresolved but that peace proposals are “nearly ready.”On a positive note, Ushakov told reporters that it was agreed that Russian, Ukrainian and US officials will hold talks on security issues related to a prospective peace deal in the United Arab Emirates on Friday.Ushakov noted that Trump’s envoys informed Putin about Trump’s meeting with Zelensky, as well as earlier discussions they had with Ukrainian and European officials.
The Kremlin talks that he described as “frank, constructive” and “fruitful” began when it was just before midnight in Moscow and lasted nearly four hours.Witkoff and Kushner were joined by Josh Gruenbaum, the head of the Federal Acquisition Service who serves as a senior adviser on Trump’s Board of Peace that Russia has been invited to join.While Russia is considering the inv...