Special envoys of U.S. President Donald Trump, Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, visited Kyiv for the first time, where they held several rounds of negotiations with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. According to the Financial Times, citing sources familiar with the course of the consultations, the American side presented updated versions of earlier peace documents, but no breakthrough in ending the war was achieved.
Updated Documents Instead of New Ideas
According to FT sources, the drafts were revised to reflect changed circumstances after peace talks stalled in February amid the start of the U.S. war with Iran. At the same time, the publication's sources emphasize that there were few genuinely new ideas in the proposals: Witkoff and Kushner were primarily trying to revive earlier work and narrow the gaps between Kyiv and Moscow.
The Parties' Positions
One of the main issues was the territory of the Donbas, which remains under Ukrainian control. Russia claims this region but has been unable to capture it entirely: according to available data, Russian forces control about 75 percent of the eastern region. For Volodymyr Zelenskyy, the Donbas is a "red line": the president insists that Ukraine will not agree to hand over this territory or any other lands currently under Russian military control.
Contradictory Data
Public statements by American representatives and the assessments of FT sources do not fully align. Jared Kushner stated that during the discussions the U.S. put forward "new ideas," without disclosing their content, while Steve Witkoff described himself as "pleased" with the talks "in Moscow and now here," in Kyiv. However, Financial Times sources point out that no breakthrough occurred and that the discussion was more about reviving earlier documents than about fundamentally new proposals. Thus, the public rhetoric of "new ideas" and "satisfaction" contrasts with a more restrained assessment of the actual content of the documents.
Prospects and Format of Next Steps
According to FT sources, during the Sunday talks the parties agreed that the war is unlikely to end before winter, while American representatives told Zelenskyy and his team that progress could still be achieved by winter. After the meeting, Kushner reported that the U.S. hopes to resume trilateral negotiations between Ukraine, Russia, and the United States. Following September 6, when representatives of Britain, France, and Germany joined the talks with Zelenskyy, Ukraine, the U.S., and European countries agreed to continue the dialogue for a just peace, while the format of the next round of consultations is being coordinated.
