Russia willing to resume trilateral peace talks in November, Kremlin says after Witkoff meeting

Russian President Vladimir Putin said the Kremlin would be ready to resume trilateral Russia-US-Ukraine peace talks after mid-November, at the request of US special envoy Steve Witkoff who met with Putin for around three hours Wednesday.

The meeting in St. Petersburg came off the back of Witkoff’s “productive” Tuesday summit with Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky in Norway, as the United States seeks to advance proposals to end to the war.

Putin said he would be ready to resume trilateral talks after November 10, according to a post-meeting briefing by his aide Yury Ushakov. The aide said the Kremlin would like to discuss the establishment of a “security framework” for both Russia and Ukraine following the end of the conflict, without offering further details on what Russia would demand as part of that framework.

The next trilateral round could take place in Abu Dhabi, the capital city of the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Ushakov said in response to a question on Russian state news channel Russia 24.

Despite the positive comments on potential future negotiations, there are no indications so far that Russia has budged on any of its maximalist positions.

Russia’s previous demands amount to near-total victory – calling for Ukraine to give up the entire eastern Ukrainian Donbas region, which is now mostly under Russian occupation. Moscow has also called for Ukraine to dramatically reduce the size of its military and pledge to never join NATO.

During the latest talks, Putin expressed interest in the topic of restoring economic cooperation with the United States and the possibility of a meeting with China to discuss Ukraine. That follows recent moves by the Trump administration to waive sanctions on Russia and strike a deal on diesel exports.

Speaking to media after the meeting, Russian presidential envoy Kirill Dmitriev said there was “no question” that US-Russian economic cooperation would continue, and added that a recently-announced diesel deal between the two countries would go ahead despite European criticism.