US envoy Witkoff says Ukraine talks with Russia ‘productive’

The talks travel conscionable a time earlier a 2nd circular of US-mediated talks betwixt Russia and Ukraine successful Abu Dhabi.

United States peculiar envoy Steve Witkoff has said helium held “productive and constructive meetings” with Russian peculiar envoy Kirill Dmitriev successful Florida, arsenic President Donald Trump’s medication presses to extremity Russia’s astir four-year warfare successful Ukraine.

“We are encouraged by this gathering that Russia is moving toward securing bid successful Ukraine,” wrote Witkoff successful a station connected X pursuing Saturday’s talks.

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US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law, and White House advisor Josh Gruenbaum besides attended the talks.

The gathering came a time earlier Ukrainian and Russian negotiators were scheduled to clasp a 2nd circular of talks with US mediators successful Abu Dhabi to sermon a US-backed program to extremity Russia’s war.

A archetypal US-mediated gathering was held successful the United Arab Emirates’s superior last week, marking the archetypal nonstop nationalist negotiations betwixt Moscow and Kyiv since the aboriginal weeks of the war.

Trump told reporters successful the Oval Office this week that helium believes “we are getting close” to a woody to extremity the war.

Trump announced connected Thursday that his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, had agreed to his request not to onslaught Ukraine’s vigor infrastructure for a week amid utmost acold weather, which helium said was “very nice” of the Russian president.

The Kremlin confirmed connected Friday that Putin had received the request, with spokesperson Dmitry Peskov telling Sky News the Russian person had “of course” agreed to the proposal.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy wrote connected X that the contented of a ceasefire connected vigor infrastructure attacks had been discussed during past week’s talks, and that helium expected the agreements to beryllium implemented. “De-escalation steps lend to existent advancement toward ending the war,” helium added.

On Friday, the Ukrainian person said successful his nightly code that neither Moscow nor Kyiv had conducted strikes ⁠on vigor targets from Thursday nighttime onwards.

Several sticking points implicit the US-backed program to extremity the warfare remain, including Russia’s request for Ukrainian forces to retreat from astir one-fifth of the Donetsk region, and the imaginable deployment of planetary peacekeepers successful Ukraine aft the war.