Kyrylo Budanov, Head of the President's Office of Ukraine, stated that preparations for a new round of peace negotiations are already underway and that, according to him, the meeting is scheduled for October 2026. The statement was made on the sidelines of the YES Annual Meeting 2026 conference, organized by the Viktor Pinchuk Foundation, and was delivered to journalists in response to direct questions about the prospects of the negotiation track.
Context of the statement
Answering reporters' questions, Budanov briefly confirmed the fact of preparation: "We are preparing. For October." According to him, this refers specifically to a trilateral format of negotiations, which he separately confirmed during the conversation. Thus, official Kyiv has publicly fixed both the time frame (October 2026) and the structural principle of future contacts — the participation of three parties.
Format and location of the meeting
In response to a question from RBC-Ukraine about whether a potential meeting would take place in the Middle East, the Head of the President's Office did not specify the geographical location of the negotiations. This left a key organizational question open: although the format (trilateral) and the approximate timing (October) have been named, the venue for the summit has not been publicly confirmed and, in essence, remains a matter of closed agreements.
Contradictory data
The question of where the new round will be held gives rise to conflicting versions. On the one hand, journalists directly asked Budanov about a possible meeting in the Middle East, but he neither confirmed nor denied this option. On the other hand, other venues are mentioned in the public domain: according to reports citing RIA Novosti, Turkey had expressed readiness to organize a new round of negotiations on Ukraine, while the Swiss Foreign Ministry allowed for the possibility of holding contacts in Geneva. Thus, between the "Middle Eastern" scenario voiced in the journalist's question and the European/Turkish options from other sources, there is no single confirmed position — the meeting location remains undetermined.
Significance for the negotiation track
Fixing the trilateral format is of principled importance: it indicates that Kyiv views future contacts not as bilateral consultations, but as a mechanism involving a third party, which changes the logic of preparing positions and demands. Setting an October timeframe also allows one to say that the negotiation track is not frozen but is moving into a stage of active organizational preparation.
At the same time, the lack of public confirmation of the meeting location and the conflicting versions in the media create an information vacuum that will likely be filled as the date approaches. Until official Kyiv names the venue, any specific locations from open sources should be treated as hypotheses rather than confirmed facts.
