Trump envoys and Putin discussed ‘next steps’ for ending Ukraine war, White House says

‘Substantive plans’ will be announced in ‘coming weeks’ as envoys head to Kyiv for talks with Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy

Donald Trump’s envoys “discussed substantive plans for next steps” for ending the war between Ukraine and Russia during their meeting on Saturday in Moscow with Vladimir Putin, the White House said.

Those steps would be announced in “coming weeks”, a White House official said in a statement, and the envoys “look forward to equally productive meetings tomorrow [Sunday] in Ukraine”.

Moscow said the US envoys had proposed a “number of ideas” on how to end the Ukraine war in “extremely frank” talks with the Russian president in the Kremlin late on Saturday.

Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov said the Americans “put forward a number of ideas on possible routes to a settlement”, on which he did not elaborate.

Ushakov said Russia had told the US envoys that Moscow was “confident” it could achieve its military goals of seizing the rest of eastern Ukraine, in comments implying the Kremlin’s stance on its war against Ukraine had not changed.

Meanwhile, the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, said Russian attacks on Kyiv and Boryspil international airports – which service the Ukrainian capital – were “clearly” a reaction to the possibility of the US negotiators flying to Kyiv after the talks in Moscow.

Zelenskyy on Saturday said Kyiv had “taken note of this Russian move, and next week we will adjust our operation accordingly regarding Russian airspace, which has become dangerous because of our drones and missiles in the sky”.

“Of course, there are and will be no threats to diplomacy from our side.”

Officials visiting Ukraine have largely done so by train, as Ukrainian airspace has been closed since 2022 due to the war.

Russia and Ukraine had vowed not to strike each other’s capitals for three days during the negotiations, as Washington tries to revive US-led talks to end Europe’s worst conflict since the second world war.

The Moscow visit came as Donald Trump suggested on Friday he had a new proposal to end the war, without providing any details. Trump made ending the war a priority early in his second term, but little has changed so far.

Trump said his son-in-law Kushner and business ally Witkoff were bringing “a proposal to end the war”.

“Dear colleagues, I warmly welcome you to Moscow. The situation is, of course, not simple,” Putin told the envoys in a grand Kremlin hall in footage aired by Russian TV. “But before we begin to address it, I would like to ask everyone to convey their best wishes and words of gratitude to US president Mr Trump.”

The grinding war, launched by Russia in 2022, saw increasing civilian deaths and attacks this summer. Putin has repeatedly said Moscow intends to seize the rest of east Ukraine. The war has killed hundreds of thousands and displaced millions.

Russian strikes on Ukraine on Saturday killed at least seven people, including in the Kyiv suburbs, Ukrainian officials said.

The Kremlin said it would not strike Kyiv from midnight on Saturday, while the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, said he would halt strikes on Moscow until Monday.

Zelenskyy said he had spoken to the US officials and expected them in Kyiv on Sunday.

Large gaps remain between Russia and Ukraine on how to end the war. On Friday, the Kremlin said it was sticking by the position Putin set out two years earlier: that Ukraine should give up four regions claimed by Russia and not join Nato. That position is intolerable to Ukraine.

As peace efforts have floundered in recent months, with US attention turned to its war with Iran, the conflict has intensified.

Ground troops have been locked in a grinding stalemate along the 775-mile (1,250km) frontline with little advance on either side. Both sides have intensified their aerial attacks in recent weeks, hitting increasingly distant targets.

Ukraine has carried out long-range strikes on Russian military facilities, oil refineries and e-commerce warehouses, to try to degrade Russia’s war effort and economy. Its strikes on Russian oil refineries have led to fuel shortages and rising prices at the petrol pumps.

On Friday, a Russian drone hit the headquarters of Ukraine’s SBU security service, one of the agencies responsible for carrying out deep-strike operations in Russia. Zelenskyy vowed to retaliate. Russia has also increased its attacks on Kyiv and other cities with waves of bombardments, stretching Ukraine’s air defences.

Russia on Friday night struck the Kyiv suburbs, reportedly killing two people in the Bucha district. An attack on the Dnipro region killed five people and wounded five more at a factory, according to the local military administration head, Oleksandr Hanzha.

He said those killed were employees working at the factory who were “doing their job when enemy missiles cut off their lives”. A 62-year-old man was injured and several homes and a building were damaged in another attack on the region’s Nikopol district, Hanzha said.

Russia also struck a shopping centre in the southern Mykolaiv region with drones overnight, damaging the building and injuring a 72-year-old man and a 17-year-old girl. Emergency services said they were repeatedly forced to withdraw because of the threat of more strikes.