Zelenskiy: U.S. Envoys Present ‘Decent Ideas’
U.S. peace negotiators Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner presented several “decent ideas” during talks aimed at ending the war with Russia, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Tuesday in Kyiv.
Witkoff and Kushner visited both Russia and Ukraine over the weekend, holding several hours of talks with Zelenskiy and Russian President Vladimir Putin as diplomatic efforts continued without a breakthrough without success.
However, the meetings failed to produce a breakthrough on ending the war, which had now entered its fifth year amid continued fighting and growing international pressure from all sides so far.
Zelenskiy told reporters in a WhatsApp media chat that he planned to meet U.S. President Donald Trump later in September to discuss winter air defence support measures during their next meeting.
“As for the peace package that Kushner spoke of, and the new ideas, I can tell you that there were really some very decent, worthwhile ideas,” Zelenskiy said during weekend talks.
He gave no further details, saying Kyiv had agreed with the U.S. envoys to work on the proposals first before making any public commitments or announcements about them at this stage.
Ukraine and Russia remain far apart in their positions on how to end the war, with major disagreements continuing over territory, security guarantees, and the future peace framework and disputed territory.
A key issue is the fate of remaining Ukrainian-held territory in the eastern Donbas region, which Moscow claimed as its own but had failed to capture despite years of fighting there.
Diplomatic efforts to end the war had stalled for months, and Zelenskiy said he was grateful to the United States for efforts to revive negotiations and diplomacy in the coming days.
He said Ukrainian, U.S. and European representatives would meet soon to prepare for a trilateral meeting aimed at advancing discussions and identifying possible areas of agreement in the coming days.
The next meeting could be hosted by Turkey, the United Arab Emirates, Switzerland or other countries, Zelenskiy said, as efforts continued to establish a suitable venue for negotiations for the discussions.
Zelenskiy expected grain shipments and energy infrastructure to be discussed, among other issues, adding that Ukraine remained ready for compromise during the prospective negotiations between both sides at the proposed meeting.
He said there was also a need to continue talks on prisoner-of-war exchanges, with efforts required to increase their number and speed up the process considerably between the two sides.
“We need not just to discuss, but to achieve concrete results,” Zelenskiy said, stressing the need for negotiations to produce practical outcomes rather than continued diplomatic exchanges in the coming weeks. #Zelenskiy: U.S. Envoys Present ‘Decent Ideas’# Zelensky: Ukraine Wants Peace but Won’t Surrender
