US sent to Moscow to meet with Putin

Oamerican envoys Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff arrived in Moscow today to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin before heading to Dublin to meet Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelensky.

The two envoys were received at the departure of Vnukovo airport in Moscow by the special representative of the Russian President, Kirill Dmitriev, according to images obtained by France-Presse news agency.

The motorcade left the airport at 05:00 (Lisbon time), Russian television reported.

On Wednesday, Zelensky expressed skepticism about Putin's talks with Kushner and Witkoff and insisted on obtaining security guarantees and sovereignty over the Donbass region.

In Dublin statements to Irish Prime Minister Micheál Martin, Zelensky said that the United States will have to return with “concrete proposals” after contacts with the Kremlin, although he doubts that Putin is willing to facilitate any progress.

Zelensky removed the possibility of negotiating the military withdrawal of the Donbass, region in eastern Ukraine partially occupied by Russia, and noted that the outcome of the talks will largely depend on the will of the United States to press Putin.

“We need positive signals from the United States,” the Ukrainian leader noted, reiterating the demand for security guarantees that prevent a new Russian aggression, a subject that he said was still awaiting a response from both Moscow and Washington.

Despite the skepticism about the contacts of the US envoys with the leader of the Kremlin, the President of Ukraine considered it positive that the negotiations are not stopped and hopes that “there will be results this year and next.”.

After two days of meetings in Abu Dhabi, “a wide exchange of prisoners” was announced, in the expression of Russian negotiators’ chief Vladimir Medinsky, and described by Jared Kushner as the “greatest humanitarian release of prisoners”, whose details remained undisclosed.

Volodymyr Zelensky said in Dublin that he was awaiting further details from the U.S. team, but he hoped Moscow would agree to the humanitarian release of up to 1,200 prisoners.

Russia has made the negotiations on the war that started against Ukraine almost five years ago dependent on the definition of a new security architecture in Europe, an idea that has been receiving the support of American President Donald Trump.

Negotiations between Kyiv and Moscow were resumed after more than eight months of paralysis, due to the transfer of Washington's focus to the war unleashed together with Israel on 28 February against Iran.

In the previous rounds, Russia and Ukraine have not made progress on the fundamental issues mainly related to the future of the regions occupied by the Moscow forces and the security guarantees to Kyiv.