Five hours of talks between Russian President Vladimir Putin and U.S. negotiators did not yield a breakthrough on a potential Ukraine peace deal, a Kremlin aide said early Wednesday.
US President Donald Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff and son-in-law Jared Kushner attended a high-level meeting with President Vladimir Putin at the Kremlin on Tuesday, capping a week of intense diplomacy as the Trump administration continues its push to end Russia’s war in Ukraine.
The talks in the Russian capital were “very useful, constructive and very substantive,” but “no compromise option was found,” Yuri Ushakov, a Russian foreign policy adviser and close ally of President Vladimir Putin, told reporters after the meeting.
“Some of the US proposals seem more or less acceptable, but they need to be discussed,” Ushakov said, adding that other points “do not suit us.”
“The work will continue,” he said.
Among the challenges so far is the Kremlin’s demands that Ukraine formally renounce its aspirations to join NATO and hand over territory in the Donbas region of eastern Ukraine that has been annexed to Russia but not yet conquered.
The United States has not yet publicly commented on the talks, but White House press secretary Caroline Leavitt said ahead of the talks that the United States was “very optimistic” that an agreement could be reached to end the three-and-a-half year war.
A meeting between Putin and Trump is not scheduled and any face-to-face meeting “depends on the progress we can make,” Ushakov said.
Ukrainian officials continue to reject Russia’s extremist demands, which the Kremlin continues to consider a red line that should not be crossed.
Ushakov said Putin and the U.S. delegation discussed the territorial issue at the meeting, but “without it, I don’t see a solution to the crisis.”
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said he planned to contact the U.S. negotiating team immediately after his meeting with Putin and was “awaiting signals” from the delegation on the outcome of the talks.
“We will receive certain signals, and if the signals go well – a fair game with our partners – then we will probably meet with the American delegation soon,” Zelenskiy said before the meeting.
The Ukrainian leader said a higher-level delegation would be sent if the message from the American side suggested an opportunity for a “global and rapid decision.”
Hours before the meeting, Putin warned that Russia was not planning war with Europe but was “ready” to respond if Europe started one.
Earlier, Putin accused European leaders of trying to block a US-proposed peace deal by “presenting demands that are absolutely unacceptable to Russia” and suggested that Ukraine’s European allies were “on the side of war”.
He added: “They themselves are rejecting peace negotiations and interfering with President Trump.”
Putin did not elaborate on his ideas, but was likely referring to changes reportedly made to Trump’s original 28-point peace plan. The plan was proposed by the United States last month and rejected by Ukraine and its European allies.
A subsequent meeting between Ukrainian and US delegations in Geneva resulted in changes to the draft, making it more favorable to Kiev.
But hours before the crucial talks, the Kremlin reiterated its position that any peace agreement must resolve what it described as the “initial causes” or “fundamental reasons” for the invasion. It is an abbreviation for a long list of demands, including an end to NATO expansion, recognition of Russia’s control over occupied territory of Ukraine, and the de facto end of Ukraine as a sovereign state.
A senior NATO official told reporters there was no sign that Russia was prepared to make “meaningful concessions” to end the war in Ukraine. The official said Russia maintains its territorial claims and will continue to “aim to weaken Ukraine’s military power as much as possible in order to pave the way for further aggression.”
Putin’s talks with the United States include U.S. officials and a Ukrainian delegation meeting in Miami on Sunday, with Secretary of State Marco Rubio calling the meeting “very productive” but warning that more work remains.
Mr Witkov and Mr Kushner, who do not hold official positions in the US government, have re-emerged as central figures in the administration’s diplomatic efforts and may have been seen strolling around Moscow’s Red Square with Kremlin representative Kirill Dmitriev before the meeting, according to footage from Russia’s state-run TASS news agency.
Earlier, Vitkov and Dmitriev had lunch at a Michelin-starred restaurant in Moscow, where they ate caviar, quail, venison and crab, the restaurant’s director Maxim Romantsev told Russia’s Izvestia newspaper.
