Kyiv, Ukraine – Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said talks with US President Donald Trump’s envoys have begun in Kyiv as Ukraine seeks progress toward ending the war with Russia.
“We began talks,” Zelensky said Sunday.
Ahead of the meeting, Zelensky met with Ukraine’s negotiating team and said Kyiv had prepared its proposals for discussions with US envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner.
“We are ready for the conversation. Ukraine has always been and will remain constructive. We are interested in bringing the end of the war closer,” Zelensky said.
“Peace is needed. Security guarantees are needed. A dignified character of the postwar peace is needed. Our proposals are ready,” he added.
Zelensky said Ukraine wants the negotiations to proceed in a coordinated and realistic manner as diplomatic efforts to find a path toward ending the war continue.
“It is important to work in a coordinated, substantive, and realistic manner,” he said.
The meeting follows weeks of contact between Kyiv and Washington over possible steps toward a peace settlement.
Zelensky and the two US envoys discussed their planned visit to Ukraine during a phone call on Aug. 31. The Ukrainian president said at the time that their negotiating teams remained in regular contact and that an in-person meeting could help develop possible solutions toward peace.
Ukraine has repeatedly identified security guarantees as a central part of any settlement. Zelensky has also insisted that an eventual agreement must produce what he calls a peace with dignity, a position he reiterated in previous discussions with Witkoff and Kushner.
