US envoys arrive in Moscow ahead of Ukraine talks

Two of President Donald Trump’s top envoys, Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, have landed in Moscow on Saturday and will meet President Vladimir Putin before travelling to Kyiv on Sunday for meetings with President Volodymyr Zelensky. Trump says the envoys bring a proposal to end the war, though earlier U.S.‑led peace efforts have failed to secure a breakthrough. The officials are expected to have separate talks with both leaders, and their arrival at Vnukovo Airport was greeted by Russian diplomat Kirill Dmitriev.

Flight tracking data shows the U.S. government aircraft moved from Helsinki earlier in the day; this will be the envoys’ first trip to Kyiv since Trump returned to office. Zelensky warned that Russia had recently launched “demonstrative” strikes on the airports of Kyiv and Boryspil ahead of the planned talks, and he promised to extend protection of Russian airspace for the envoys as a sign of reciprocal courtesy. Ukraine’s airspace has been closed since the February 2022 full‑scale invasion.

Zelensky also reported a nighttime Russian strike on a civilian building in the Dnipro region, killing four people and injuring five. The U.S. delegation’s visit comes just after a rare CIA head‑of‑agency visit to Moscow by John Ratcliffe. No official comment has been made by Washington or Moscow about the talks, and Trump described the meeting as semi‑routine.

Last year, separate U.S., Russian, and Ukrainian talks suggested that a peace deal might be closing in, but talks in Paris and other venues ended without resolution, largely because of disputes over control of territory and security guarantees for Ukraine. In recent months both sides have intensified their aerial attacks, with Ukraine struggling to repel strikes due to a lack of interceptor missiles while Kyiv focuses its strikes on Russian economic infrastructure.