Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump’s top team fail to deliver breakthrough on territorial disputes
Talks between Russia and the US ended after five hours without a breakthrough on a possible peace deal to end the war in Ukraine.
The meeting in Moscow, between Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump’s top envoys Steve Witkoff, and son-in-law Jared Kushner, was “productive”, according to a Kremlin adviser, but failed to reach agreement on key sticking points.
Putin’s top foreign policy aide, Yuri Ushakov, said the Russian president had reacted negatively to some US proposals.
“Compromises have not yet been found,” Ushakov, said, adding: “There is still a lot of work to be done.”
Putin ‘ready for war’
The meeting came after Putin accused European countries of trying to sabotage peace talks with “absolutely unacceptable” demands.
He claimed they “they don’t have a peace agenda, they’re on the side of the war.”
“We are not planning to go to war with Europe,” he said. “But if Europe wants to and starts, we are ready right now.”
Putin also threatened to sever Ukraine’s access to the sea in response to drone attacks on tankers of Russia’s “shadow fleet” in the Black Sea.
Ukraine’s Foreign Minister, Andrii Sybiha, said Putin’s remarks showed he was not ready to end the war.
Ushakov said a meeting between Putin and Trump was not currently planned, but added there were huge opportunities for US-Russian economic cooperation.
No progress on territorial disputes
Trump’s peace proposal – which was criticised for being too sympathetic to Moscow – had granted some of the Kremlin’s core demands that Kyiv has rejected as nonstarters, such as Ukraine ceding the entire eastern region of the Donbas to Russia and renouncing its bid to join Nato.
Negotiators have indicated the framework has changed, but it is not clear how.
Ushakov said “so far, a compromise hasn’t been found” on the issue of territories, “without which we see no resolution to the crisis.”
While both sides could agree “on some things,” there were also proposals that evoked Moscow’s criticism and “even negative attitude,” he said.
He called the conversation that lasted for five hours “rather useful, constructive and rather substantive” and said the work will continue.
Almost all countries recognise Donbas as part of Ukraine.
Ushakov said Putin had sent a series of important signals and his greetings to Trump, but that both sides had agreed not to disclose details to the media.
Referring to the talks in a post on social platform X, Russian presidential envoy Kirill Dmitriev simply wrote: “productive.”
Zelensky says ‘no easy solutions’
A leaked set of 28 US draft peace proposals emerged in November, alarming Ukrainian and European officials who said it bowed to Moscow’s main demands.
European powers then came up with a counter-proposal, and at talks in Geneva, the US and Ukraine said they had created an “updated and refined peace framework” to end the war.
Volodymyr Zelensky, speaking at a press conference with Irish Taoiseach Micheál Martin in Dublin, had urged there to be no games behind Ukraine’s back during the talks.
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“There will be no easy solutions … It is important that everything is fair and open, so that there are no games behind Ukraine’s back,” he said.
“That nothing is decided without Ukraine about us, about our future.
“The most sensitive things and the most complex issues concern territories, frozen assets.”
With agencies
