War in Ukraine: Russia believes that the proposals transmitted after Oslo “do not contain much”

The Kremlin estimated on Wednesday October 21 that the proposals to end the war in Ukraine formulated by kyiv and the Europeans the day before in Oslo and transmitted to Vladimir Putin by the American envoy Steve Witkoff “do not involve much”. Steve Witkoff spoke for nearly three hours on Wednesday in St. Petersburg with Vladimir Putin during a “detailed and frank” meeting, Kremlin diplomatic advisor Yuri Ushakov told journalists, including those from AFP.

“Steve Witkoff informed Vladimir Putin of the content of the negotiations held in Oslo (...), and underlined certain new elements in the approaches of the Europeans and kyiv, even if these did not include much,” he indicated. Vladimir Putin nevertheless informed the American envoy that Russia was “in principle ready to resume negotiations around November 10” between Moscow, kyiv and Washington. According to Yuri Ushakov, these talks must focus on “the establishment of a security system (...) after the end of the conflict”.

Direct negotiations between Russians, Ukrainians and Americans took place in 2025 without much result, kyiv and Moscow sticking to their positions. They have been at a standstill since the start of the year. The Kremlin advisor also mentioned a possible meeting between Vladimir Putin, Donald Trump and Xi Jinping in China, on the sidelines of the APEC summit in November in Shenzhen. “This idea is not rejected (...) neither by Moscow, nor by Washington, nor by Beijing. Our Chinese friends, hosts of the APEC summit, are taking care of its preparation,” said Yuri Ushakov.

This would be the first dedicated trilateral meeting between the leaders of the three largest world powers. Meanwhile, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said in an interview on Fox News on Wednesday that the front should be frozen as a first step in talks to end the war.