 "‘Positions closer’: Kremlin signals progress as Trump envoy Witkoff holds 4th meeting with Putin")
US President Donald Trump’s envoy Steve Witkoff on Friday met Russian President Vladimir Putin for three hours in Moscow to discuss Washington’s proposal for ending the war in Ukraine.
According to a Reuters report, Kremlin said the talks brought the two sides’ positions closer together.
Kremlin foreign policy adviser Yuri Ushakov, who participated in the meeting, called the discussion “constructive and very useful.”
“This conversation allowed Russia and the United States to further bring their positions closer together, not only on Ukraine but also on a number of other international issues,” Reuters quoted him as saying.
“As for the Ukrainian crisis itself, the discussion focused in particular on the possibility of resuming direct negotiations between representatives of the Russian Federation and Ukraine,” Ushakov added.
Russia and Ukraine have not engaged in direct negotiations since the early weeks of the conflict, which began in February 2022.
Witkoff, a real estate billionaire, did not immediately comment on the meeting.
He has recently taken on a prominent role as Washington’s primary liaison with President Putin, as President Donald Trump continues to advocate for a deal to end the war, now entering its fourth year.
Witkoff’s latest visit comes on the heels of talks in which Ukrainian and European officials pushed back against several US proposals aimed at resolving the conflict — the deadliest Europe has seen since World War II.
It came a day after Trump criticised a Russian missile and drone attack on Kyiv that killed at least 12 people, and posted a message to Russian President Vladimir Putin on social media that read: “Vladimir, STOP!”
On Friday, Trump told reporters: “I think Russia and Ukraine, I think they’re coming along, we hope.”
Trump has also warned both sides, however, that the U.S. will abandon its effort unless there is genuine progress.
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Witkoff, who had no diplomatic experience before joining Trump’s team in January, has been portrayed by critics as out of his depth when pitched into a head-to-head negotiation with Putin, Russia’s paramount leader for the past 25 years.
Video of the start of the meeting showed the American, accompanied only by a translator, seated opposite Putin, Kremlin aide Ushakov and Russian investment envoy Kirill Dmitriev, also with an interpreter.
Witkoff has at times been accused of echoing the Kremlin’s narrative. In an interview with journalist Tucker Carlson last month, for example, Witkoff said there was no reason why Russia would want to absorb Ukraine or bite off more of its territory, and it was “preposterous” to think that Putin would want to send his army marching across Europe.
Ukraine and many of its European allies say the opposite - that Putin, unless prevented, would try to overrun Ukraine and potentially attack a European NATO member. Putin denies any designs on NATO territory, and Moscow has repeatedly cast such charges as evidence of European hostility and “Russophobia”.
According to texts seen by Reuters, the peace proposal Witkoff has presented calls for formal U.S. recognition of Russia’s control over Crimea - the Ukrainian peninsula Moscow seized and annexed in 2014 - plus de facto recognition of Russia’s hold on areas of southern and eastern Ukraine that its forces control.
A rival European and Ukrainian document defers detailed discussion about territory until after a ceasefire is concluded, with no mention of recognising Russian control over any Ukrainian territory.
There are also differences over the lifting of sanctions on Russia, the shape of security guarantees for Ukraine and the future size of the Ukrainian military.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said this week that recognising Crimea as part of Russia would violate Ukraine’s constitution.
Trump, in an interview with Time magazine published on Friday, said: “Crimea will stay with Russia. And Zelenskiy understands that, and everybody understands that it’s been with them for a long time.”
With inputs from agencies
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