Witkoff Confirms Progress Toward New Trilateral Talks

US Special Envoy Steve Witkoff confirmed that progress had been made during the envoys’ visit to Moscow and Kyiv this weekend, including movement on scheduling additional trilateral talks. Witkoff shared the update in a statement on X on Monday, Sept. 7, detailing the delegation’s meetings with President Volodymyr Zelensky and Russian President Vladimir Putin.JOIN US ON TELEGRAMFollow our coverage of the war on the @Kyivpost_official. He said the trip had been carried out under US President Donald Trump’s direction. Alongside envoy Jared Kushner, the trip included officials from the National Security Council, State Department and Treasury Department. “Substantive progress was made, including movement on scheduling additional trilateral talks,” Witkoff said, adding that “President Trump is working hard to stop the killing and work towards a lasting and durable peace.” Zelensky echoed the development earlier on Monday, saying that Ukraine was planning its “next steps” following three rounds of negotiations in Kyiv, in which the representatives of the E3 – France, the UK and Germany – also participated. After the meetings had concluded Sunday, Zelensky additionally held a separate one-on-one discussion with Witkoff and Kushner. Kremlin opened to trilateral talks “The most important thing is to continue working actively and jointly so that diplomacy can continue,” Zelensky said, revealing that the talks had centered on Ukraine’s air defense needs, technological cooperation with allies and a support package ahead of winter. Other Topics of Interest Zelensky Says Ukrainian Drones Struck Russian Oil Refineries, Drone Depot, Military Targets Russia says 306 Ukrainian drones were intercepted overnight as strikes hit oil facilities, military targets, and an apartment building in the Perm region. The Kremlin also weighed in Monday, with spokesperson Dmitry Peskov telling reporters that Moscow did not rule out resuming the trilateral format. However, he offered no timeline for the meetings. “It is still too early to discuss the venue and exact dates,” Peskov said. A weekend of diplomacy Witkoff and Kushner’s trip had been anticipated for months, with the two confirming – though offering no dates – that they would visit Ukraine for the first time during their tenure as presidential intermediaries following Trump’s meeting with Zelensky in the Oval Office at the White House on July 28. The envoys eventually arrived in Kyiv by train on Sunday, following a Russian strike on the capital’s airport. According to Ukrainian lawmaker Oleksiy Honcharenko on Friday, Sept. 4, ahead of the visits, a Russian drone had struck an aircraft at Zhulyany Airport, officially known as Kyiv International Airport. Though no official confirmation has been given about the strike, Honcharenko speculated that it may have been intended as a signal from Putin that he did not want to negotiate with Kyiv and Washington. Putin also explicitly rejected Ukraine’s call for a wider three-day ceasefire across the entire front line. Around the same time, The Moscow Times reported that, according to sources, Moscow had been actively working to prevent the visit from taking place. “The Russians don’t want them to visit Kyiv and are trying to make them change the plan,” the source said. However, at the start of the meeting, Putin addressed the security situation in the Ukrainian capital, stating that Russian forces had halted strikes on Kyiv starting at midnight on Sept. 5. The request for a temporary pause had been transmitted through official diplomatic and intelligence channels, Putin noted. On Saturday, Sept. 5, Witkoff and Kushner arrived in Moscow where they held a meeting with the Russian delegation, including Putin himself. According to Putin aide Yuri Ushakov, the meeting lasted three hours and 10 minutes and included formal discussions followed by an informal working dinner. Ushakov stated that the US envoys had arrived “seriously prepared” and had presented concrete ideas for a settlement. Ahead of the meetings, Gene Lange, acting head of the US Treasury’s sanctions division, had traveled to Moscow and held a preparatory session with Kirill Dmitriev, Putin’s special representative for economic cooperation. Russian officials characterized the Moscow session as “meaningful,” “frank,” and conducted in an atmosphere of mutual trust, noting that potential large-scale US-Russian commercial projects had been raised alongside conflict settlement concepts. Following those discussions, Ushakov claimed that Witkoff and Kushner had agreed to factor Putin’s battlefield assessments into their dialogue in Kyiv. Despite the diplomatic movement, Putin continues to insist on his own terms for peace, holding firm to demands that Ukraine cede the remainder of Donetsk and Luhansk regions before any frontline compromise can be reached, citing Moscow’s battlefield victories. Independent analysts have disputed Moscow’s claims of battlefield momentum behind that stance, while Kyiv categorically and consistently rejects Putin’s territorial demands as a precondition for peace. Kyiv Post is Ukraine’s first and oldest English news organization, reporting since 1995. Its international reach – 97% of readers are outside of Ukraine – make it truly Ukraine’s global voice.