Zelensky and the American delegation talked in Kiev about ending the war before winter

Talks between the Ukrainian delegation led by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and representatives of United States President Donald Trump, Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner ended in Kiev.

The Ukrainian president announced that a total of three rounds of negotiations took place on Sunday and all of them were "very substantive" (one of them involved national security advisers from Great Britain, France and Germany).

The Ukrainian leader joked that the presence of the American delegation in the Ukrainian capital "worked better than Patriot air defense systems." He expressed his wish that Americans would come more often, so that ordinary Ukrainians would be able to "live at least a little" without Russian shelling.

Sometimes you can joke about the Patriots, but we still understand that this is a very current and extremely important issue for us. If the war continues in the winter - and everything indicates this for now - we are very much counting on the "winter package", which I discussed in detail today with Steve, Jared and our European partners - said Zelensky, quoted by the Ukrainian Pravda website.

The President of Ukraine also talked about territory - in his opinion, this issue remains valid. This doesn't mean that we talked about her for a very long time, but we had the opportunity and we talked. I maintain my position that such complex issues are resolved only at the level of leaders, he emphasized.

Volodymyr Zelensky also revealed that issues of security and economic guarantees for Ukraine were also discussed. We understand what our army should be like - it must be strong, it is a basic guarantee of security for us. All this requires resources. You understand it perfectly, we all understand it. Therefore, the (security) guarantees must be strong and clear, he emphasized.

He added that everything should be done to resume trilateral talks with Russia and the United States. We have to see what Russia says about it, he admitted.

End of the war before winter? "We'll try"

Jared Kushner, an American negotiator and son-in-law of Donald Trump, also spoke about the talks in Kiev. He stated that although the US side is "working to create conditions" that will enable Russia to end the war with Ukraine before winter, there is no guarantee that such a solution will be successful.

It's a very, very complex problem, but we'll try. I think if we can do that, it will be amazing. This does not mean that we will definitely succeed, but these are very important activities, he said, quoted by the Interfax-Ukraine agency.

The representative of the American authorities stated that Washington hopes to return to the trilateral format of talks between Ukraine, the United States and Russia in the near future. We have talked to both sides, so we hope to make progress on this matter soon, he said.

The US special envoy thanked Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and the Ukrainian people for the warm welcome and conveyed Donald Trump's regards. He emphasized that the US president seeks not only to end the war, but also to create conditions for long-term peace and an end to hostility between Ukraine and Russia.