US President Donald Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff and his son-in-law Jared Kushner arrived in Kyiv on Sunday for their first publicly acknowledged visit to the Ukrainian capital. The historic visit comes just a day after Trump’s envoys held talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow, as Washington renews its push to end the war in Ukraine.
Their arrival was marked by the near-constant Russian missile and drone strikes on Kyiv, including a direct hit on Friday on the headquarters of Ukraine’s domestic security agency, the SBU.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said Sunday that Kyiv was ready for a “constructive” discussion with the American delegation, writing on Telegram that Ukraine wanted to bring “the end of the war closer” and needed both security guarantees and “a just and sustainable postwar peace.”
Russia-Ukraine War Breaking News: What happened during the Moscow meeting with Putin?
Witkoff and Kushner’s visit to Kyiv followed more than three hours of closed-door talks with Putin at the Kremlin on Saturday, a meeting that ended without any announced breakthrough, according to Russian media reports.
It marked the first in-person session between Putin and Trump’s negotiating team since their August summit in Alaska, and the first time Kushner had personally joined the talks.
Video released by Russian state broadcaster RIA Novosti showed Witkoff striking a notably warm tone with the Russian leader, telling him the delegation would carry “incredible stories and incredible memories” from the process, with Putin’s in turn thanking the pair and saying he placed “a high level of trust” in them.
Russia-Ukraine War Breaking News: What did Zelensky say ahead of the Kyiv talks?
Ahead of the American delegation’s arrival, Zelensky said Ukraine had prepared its own proposals for the discussion and stressed that any settlement needed to be durable. He separately said Russia’s persistent strikes on Ukrainian cities had left air defences stretched thin, citing an acute shortage of interceptors capable of countering incoming ballistic missiles.
Russia-Ukraine War Breaking News: Why does Ukraine remain under pressure on the battlefield?
The diplomatic push comes against the backdrop of an intensifying air war, with Russian forces continuing missile and drone strikes on Kyiv even as talks proceeded in Moscow and Kyiv. Putin said he had ordered a temporary halt to Russian strikes on the Ukrainian capital to coincide with the American delegation’s visit, though he stressed no broader ceasefire had been agreed.
Zelensky, in a post on X, said Ukraine would similarly refrain from striking Moscow through Monday, while noting the arrangement fell well short of the comprehensive ceasefire Kyiv has long sought.
Russia-Ukraine War Breaking News: How did the Kremlin characterise the discussions?
Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov described the Moscow talks as “useful,” telling reporters the American delegation had “prepared seriously for this trip” and had expressed a desire to end hostilities as quickly as possible.
He said in a statement cited by RT that Witkoff and Kushner had presented “a whole series of considerations regarding possible paths to a settlement,” though he declined to detail the substance of the discussions, adding that both sides had agreed to keep them confidential.
Putin himself gave no public indication of movement away from Russia’s longstanding demands, which continue to call for significant concessions from Ukraine.
Russia-Ukraine War Breaking News: What has the White House said about next steps?
A White House official told NBC News that the two sides had discussed “substantive plans for the next steps” in the peace effort during the Moscow talks, adding that further details would be announced in the coming weeks.
The official said American officials from the National Security Council and State Department were looking forward to what they described as “equally productive meetings” in Ukraine.
Russia-Ukraine War Breaking News: Why does this visit mark a notable shift in the diplomatic push?
Sunday’s trip is the first time Witkoff and Kushner have travelled together to Kyiv since the war began, after multiple previous visits to Moscow, including Witkoff’s sixth meeting with Putin at the Kremlin. The renewed diplomatic activity follows a period in which Washington’s peace efforts had lost momentum, with US attention consumed for much of the past six months by the separate conflict involving Iran.
Russia-Ukraine War Breaking News: What happens next in the negotiations?
With both delegations declining to disclose the specifics of the Moscow talks, attention now turns to Sunday’s discussions in Kyiv and whether the two sides can translate the diplomatic momentum into concrete progress. Officials on both sides have signalled that further details on the substance of any emerging plan are expected only in the coming weeks, leaving the durability of the current diplomatic push and the fragile, short-term halt in strikes on Kyiv and Moscow as the immediate markers of whether this latest effort produces lasting results.
