U.S. envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner concluded a three-hour meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin at the Kremlin on Saturday and were set to travel on to Kyiv on Sunday, marking the highest-level American visit to the Ukrainian capital since President Trump began his second term.
Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov described the talks as substantive and conducted in a spirit of trust, saying Putin had laid out Russia’s assessment of the conflict in detail. He said Putin reaffirmed his willingness to keep pursuing a political settlement alongside Washington, and that Witkoff and Kushner agreed to carry the Russian leader’s views into their meeting with Ukrainian officials the following day. The talks were followed by dinner with Putin, and gene Lange, the Treasury Department’s acting sanctions coordinator, joined the delegation, taking part in a preparatory session with Russian negotiator Kirill Dmitriev, though he did not sit in on the meeting with Putin himself.
Trump and Ukrainian officials have indicated the envoys are carrying a renewed ceasefire proposal, though it remains unclear how much it differs from earlier plans that stalled over territorial demands Putin has said remain non-negotiable and that Kyiv has rejected.
To clear the way for the Kyiv visit, Russia and Ukraine agreed to a brief pause in strikes; Putin said the halt on Russian attacks would run from midnight Saturday through the American delegation’s time in Ukraine, while stressing that no broader ceasefire had been agreed. The pause comes after Russia sharply intensified missile and drone strikes on Kyiv and other Ukrainian cities in recent days, including a direct hit Friday on the headquarters of Ukraine’s domestic security service. President Volodymyr Zelensky said Ukraine would refrain from striking Moscow while the U.S. delegation is in the region, and has separately warned that a shortage of air-defense interceptors is leaving Ukrainian cities increasingly exposed to Russian missile attacks.
Negotiations between Washington, Moscow and Kyiv had been largely dormant for roughly six months, since fighting between the U.S. and Iran diverted American diplomatic attention earlier this year.
