Ukraine war: Talks ended after two hours – Russia and Ukraine agree prisoner exchange

The peace talks in Abu Dhabi have brought no progress on the ceasefire, only a further prisoner exchange has been agreed.

US special envoys Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff are flying to Moscow to clarify the number of prisoners for the exchange with President Vladimir Putin.

Russia refuses to allow European security advisers to take part in the negotiations because they supported the warring party as arms suppliers.

Berlin. The two-day peace talks between Russia, Ukraine and the USA in Abu Dhabi ended on Wednesday without any result. The two warring parties only agreed on a further exchange of prisoners of war, but there was no progress on the issue of a ceasefire.

US special envoys Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff announced they would fly to Moscow on Thursday to discuss next steps with Russian President Vladimir Putin. Among other things, the number of prisoners of war for exchange should be determined.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyj had spoken of 1,000 or 1,500 prisoners on each side. The two countries had already exchanged prisoners several times, even without US mediation.

From Moscow, the duo wants to fly on to Dublin to meet Zelensky. The Ukrainian president is there at the European Political Community summit.

The talks in Abu Dhabi ended after just two hours on the second day. On the first day we sat together for four hours. These were the first trilateral negotiations between Russia, Ukraine and the USA since February.

Several national security advisers from Europe were also on site, but were not at the table at the three-way meeting. Russia rejected this with the argument that the Europeans, as weapons suppliers to Ukraine, were a party to the war.

Kushner said they are working on including Europeans in the format in the future. The USA worked closely with the Europeans in Abu Dhabi and represented a common position.

All topics were discussed, including the difficult territorial questions, said Kushner. However, there was no rapprochement. Russia continues to insist on preserving all of Donbass, including areas it has not yet conquered. Ukraine rejects this.

Zelensky told reporters on Tuesday that the Russian delegation had claimed in the talks to control areas in Donbass that were still in Ukrainian hands. “That’s the problem,” he said. “Putin lives in a different reality.”

The Russian president always tells the Americans that he is close to completely conquering Donbass. After all, the USA shared the Ukrainian assessment of the combat situation.

Ukraine has proposed settling the territorial issue at a presidential summit. However, Putin does not want to meet with Zelensky. The Ukrainian president said Kushner and Witkoff believed in dialogue, deals and sanctions relief to make Russia willing to compromise. In his opinion, however, there needs to be “more pressure on Russia and less business with these guys.”