Steve Witkoff said after meeting Vladimir Putin in Moscow that Vladimir Putin US envoy talks had restarted, with a new round of trilateral talks agreed and Europe set to join. Witkoff and Jared Kushner were then on their way to Dublin to meet Volodymyr Zelenskyy, carrying the talks from Moscow into the next phase.
Moscow meeting and new format
Witkoff said, "I think progress was made today. … I think it was made earlier today. Abu Dhabi was, people didn’t think that we were going to restart trilateral. We’ve restarted it; we’ve set a new meeting now on top of that, and this is what President Trump wants to see." The wording matters because it points to a process that is no longer limited to Russia and Ukraine alone; Europe is now set to enter the room as part of the peace process.
The Kremlin said the talks between Vladimir Putin and the 2 US envoys had been useful. Yuri Ushakov said the American side had supported Vladimir Putin's proposal for a joint humanitarian mission to a city in eastern Ukraine, and Ushakov also said direct peace talks with Ukraine, which resumed this week after a pause of 9 months, would continue.
Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Dublin
Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner were on their way to Dublin to meet Volodymyr Zelenskyy after leaving Moscow. Flightradar24 records showed the 2 US envoys in Helsinki after departure, while RTÉ reported that they had left Moscow en route for Dublin.
The sequence leaves Zelenskyy next in line to hear what Moscow has signaled and what Washington wants to test. A broader format could force Russia, Ukraine and European participants to confront the same questions in one setting: what a joint humanitarian mission would do in practice, and what terms can survive direct talks after a 9-month pause.
Donald Trump and Apec summit
Yuri Ushakov said Vladimir Putin would continue discussions on Ukraine with Donald Trump at an Apec summit in China later this month. That gives the Moscow meeting immediate follow-through: the peace process is moving from one bilateral exchange to another, with the next answers expected from Ukraine, Europe and the US before the China meeting.
