Ukrainian and European officials had ‘productive’ talks on ending war, US envoy says

A White House envoy said on Sunday he held “productive and constructive” talks in Florida with Ukrainian and European representatives to end the nearly four-year war between Russia and Ukraine.

Posting on social media, Steve Witkoff said the talks aimed at aligning on a shared strategic approach between Ukraine, the US and Europe.

“Our shared priority is to stop the killing, ensure guaranteed security, and create conditions for Ukraine’s recovery, stability, and long-term prosperity. Peace must be not only a cessation of hostilities, but also a dignified foundation for a stable future,” said Donald Trump’s special envoy to the Middle East.

The talks are part of the Trump administration’s months-long push for peace. The US president has unleashed an extensive diplomatic push to end the war, but his efforts have run into sharply conflicting demands by Moscow and Kyiv. The Russian president, Vladimir Putin, has recently signaled he is digging in on his maximalist demands on Ukraine, as Moscow’s troops inch forward on the battlefield despite huge losses.

Witkoff’s assessment comes as negotiations have been proceeding with Russia as well. A Kremlin envoy said on Saturday that the talks were pressing on “constructively” in Florida.

“The discussions are proceeding constructively. They began earlier and will continue today, and will also continue tomorrow,” Kirill Dmitriev told reporters in Miami on Saturday. There were no immediate updates on the talks with Russia on Sunday.

Dmitriev met with Witkoff and Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner, the Russian state news agency RIA Novosti reported.

For Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelenskyy wrote on Telegram on Sunday that diplomatic efforts were “moving forward quite quickly, and our team in Florida has been working with the American side”.

The Kremlin denied on Sunday that trilateral talks involving Ukraine, Russia and the US were under discussion, after Zelenskyy said on Saturday that Washington had proposed the idea of three-way discussions.

“At present, no one has seriously discussed this initiative, and to my knowledge it is not being prepared,” Putin’s foreign affairs adviser, Yuri Ushakov, said, according to Russian state news agencies.

In Ukraine, the country’s human rights ombudsman Dmytro Lubinets on Sunday accused Russian forces of forcibly removing about 50 Ukrainian civilians from the Ukrainian Sumy border region to Russian territory.

Writing on Telegram, he said that Russian forces illegally detained the residents in the village of Hrabovske on Thursday, before moving them to Russia on Saturday.

Lubinets said he contacted Russia’s human rights commissioner, requesting information on the civilians’ whereabouts and conditions, and demanding their immediate return to Ukraine.

The French presidency on Sunday welcomed Putin’s willingness to speak with Emmanuel Macron, saying it would decide how to proceed “in the coming days”.

“As soon as the prospect of a ceasefire and peace negotiations becomes clearer, it becomes useful again to speak with Putin,” Macron’s office said in a statement. “It is welcome that the Kremlin publicly agrees to this approach.”

The statement came after reports that Putin was open to holding talks with the French president if there was mutual political will.

European Union leaders agreed on Friday to provide €90bn ($106bn) to Ukraine to meet its military and economic needs for the next two years, although they failed to bridge differences with Belgium that would have allowed them to use frozen Russian assets to raise the funds. Instead, they were borrowed from capital markets.