Donald Trump's emissaries, his son-in-law Jared Kushner and businessman Steve Witkoff, completed their last mission this Sunday in Kyiv. This was not without difficulty, since they had to relaunch the peace negotiations between Russia and Ukraine. After meeting with Vladimir Putin in the Kremlin on Saturday, the American mediators arrived in the Ukrainian capital for the first time by train to meet with Volodymyr Zelensky.
Beyond praise and good words, no concrete progress was made public towards the solution of a war that has lasted more than four and a half years.
One by one. Yuri Ushakov, a Kremlin adviser present at the more than three-hour meeting on Saturday, described the meeting of Trump's men with Putin as "constructive, frank and useful." After today's meetings in Kyiv, Witkoff said he felt optimistic and assured that the US hopes to find a diplomatic solution. And the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelensky, assured that the peace negotiations with the American emissaries had been “very substantial.” However, The Kyiv Independent headlined tonight that “the war will continue,” a statement so often repeated that it sounds like resignation.
Following negotiations with Trump's emissaries, Zelensky informed reporters that economic and security guarantees for Ukraine had been discussed, as well as the shipment of missiles for its anti-aircraft defenses, as well as a support package for next winter. And, “as it seems,” Ukraine will have no choice but to live its fifth winter at war.
The Ukrainian president acknowledged that the current initiative to achieve peace will not lead to the end of the war in the short term. “If the war continues, and we anticipate that it will continue, we have the winter aid package... for both air defense and the energy sector,” he explained.
Despite the reality, Zelensky assured that the resumption of diplomatic negotiations is already a positive step in itself. Washington's mediation efforts came to a halt when Israel and the US began bombing Iran on February 28. Washington's attention was then focused on the Middle East and the Ukrainian question was frozen.
Both Zelensky and Kushner expressed their hope that tripartite contacts, that is, negotiations between Moscow and Kyiv with the Americans as mediators, can be resumed.
The US representatives also met with the national security advisers of Germany, France and the United Kingdom, which support Kyiv. It was agreed with them, Zelensky said, to repeat meetings like this Sunday's in the coming weeks to, Kushner added, look for “ways to advance” the peace process.
The trip of Trump's emissaries has served to confirm that Russia continues to maintain its maximalist demands. On Saturday, Putin expressed his desire to continue “joint work with the Americans in the search for a political-diplomatic solution,” but, according to Ushakov, he insisted on the Nazi tendencies of the Ukrainian Government and the need to eliminate “all the original causes of the conflict,” which means that Ukraine renounces joining NATO.
Witkoff said Sunday that Russia and Ukraine must make “concessions” for the war to end. The main issue where it is urgent to make these concessions is territorially. In this, the Russian position is the one that Putin marked in the summer of 2024: there will only be a ceasefire if Kyiv's troops leave the areas of the Ukrainian province of Donetsk that they still control. That would allow Moscow to keep the entire eastern Donbass region (made up of Donetsk and Luhansk) and Putin to show a victory.
But Zelensky has always refused to give up territory, because for the Ukrainians it would be like a surrender. The Ukrainian leader repeated this Sunday that this issue can only be resolved if there is a personal meeting between him and Putin. “The situation is, of course, not easy,” Putin told Witkoff and Kushner on Saturday. If, as Zelensky fears, the war has to continue next winter, will there be an agreement afterwards and can the hell and the killings end? That will be a task for another mission in this long process towards peace.
