Five hours of talks in Moscow between the U.S. delegation and Russian President Vladimir Putin over a U.S. plan to resolve the war in Ukraine ended without a “compromise option,” the Kremlin said Wednesday, adding that its military victories had swayed the Americans.
Even without a comprehensive briefing on what transpired during the lengthy talks Tuesday, it did not appear as if the swift end to the conflict desired by President Donald Trump is near. Ukrainian and European officials expressed doubt on Wednesday about Putin’s interest in ending the war diplomatically.
“So far no compromise option has been found, but some American proposals appear more or less acceptable,” said Putin’s top foreign policy aide, Yuri Ushakov, who attended the meeting and spoke to Russian media right afterward. “The president did not hide our critical or negative view of certain proposals.”
Later Wednesday, Ushakov said the Russian “successes on the front in recent weeks have had a positive impact on the course and nature” of talks and forced the United States and the West at large to make “more adequate assessments of the situation in Ukraine.”
His remark echoes Putin’s constant assertions that any deal must be based on “realities on the ground” and that he is not prepared to make concessions because he believes his army can succeed militarily.
The U.S. delegation for the first time included Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner joining the president’s special envoy, Steve Witkoff. As they were headed to Moscow on Monday, Putin and his top brass announced the capture of Pokrovsk, a key logistics hub in the Donetsk region of eastern Ukraine, which could pave the way for Russian forces to capture the two remaining key cities in the area still under Ukrainian control.
The Ukrainian military has said fierce fighting is still underway. A senior NATO official said that although Russian forces “currently control over 95 percent of the city,” a collapse of wider Ukrainian defensive lines is not expected.
“If and when captured, it is likely that Russia will use the city for logistics and as a springboard to attack other cities in Donetsk [region],” said the official, who like others spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the topic. “Still, an imminent collapse of Ukrainian defenses is unlikely in the near term. … Taking the remainder of Donetsk is not a realistic possibility for the Russians for at least another year or two.”
NATO officials have previously assessed that it would take Russia at least three to four years to fully capture Donetsk. One of Moscow’s demands for a ceasefire is for Ukraine to relinquish the remaining 20 percent of the region it still holds.
Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha said Wednesday that Witkoff had contact with the Ukrainian side after the talks with Putin and that a visit to the U.S. is being worked out for further discussions.
“This is a sensitive process. It is important not to disclose details,” he told journalists in Brussels. He added that the document being discussed was evolving and talked about a 20-point plan, while Russia had referred to a 28-point plan in Tuesday’s talks. “The U.S. representatives informed us that, in their assessment, the talks in Moscow had a positive effect for the peace process. That is their evaluation.”
The U.S. delegation presented Putin with four documents outlining Washington’s plan. The Kremlin said the two sides agreed not to share the contents of the talks with the media to avoid “megaphone diplomacy,” but analysts believe the four documents break down the initial 28-point plan into four separate issues, probably dealing with territory, economic reintegration of both countries and security guarantees.
Ushakov said the discussion touched directly on territorial issues, which Moscow considers essential to any resolution, as well as the “huge opportunities” for future U.S.-Russian economic cooperation, which is something Moscow has been pitching to Washington in a bid to expand the talks on a potential truce in Ukraine to discussions on restoring wider bilateral relations.
“But some American proposals appear more or less acceptable — and they need to be discussed,” Ushakov added. “Certain wording we were offered is unacceptable. So, the work will continue.”
Alexander Baunov, an analyst with Carnegie Russia Eurasia Center, said that Moscow views the initial 28-point plant as its starting point in negotiations and won’t accept a version that makes the proposal less favorable to the Kremlin. Before the meeting, U.S. and Ukrainian negotiators had modified the proposal to make it more palatable to Kyiv, but it is not clear if that was the proposal presented to Putin.
“Putin is happy with the war’s progress. He changes into his military uniform three times a month and personally commands generals over maps,” Baunov said in a Telegram post, referring to Putin’s increasingly frequent television appearances in uniform to receive positive war news.
Meanwhile, NATO foreign ministers who are convening in Brussels on Wednesday said they would assess progress in the talks on the U.S. plan. But several European officials conceded early Wednesday that they still did not know their outcome.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio skipped the meeting in Brussels, fueling European unease that key allies are being sidelined in negotiations with Russia. Deputy Secretary of State Christopher Landau joined his counterparts at NATO instead.
Rubio, who was also not part of the Moscow delegation, said late Tuesday that “some progress” had been made on the truce proposal, but “we’re still not there — we’re still not close enough.” He stressed that “only Putin can end this war on the Russian side,” and highlighted a major sticking point: Moscow’s demand that Ukrainian forces withdraw from the entire Donbas region. Ukraine has long rejected ceding territory Russia has failed to seize militarily.
“What they’re literally fighting over now is about a 30- to 50-kilometer space and the 20 percent of the Donetsk region that remains,” Rubio said on Fox News. “And so what we have tried to do — and I think have made some progress — is figure out what could the Ukrainians live with that gives them security guarantees for the future they’re never going to be invaded again.”
European diplomats said core issues remain unresolved. The key open questions include where to freeze the conflict, and what security guarantees Kyiv can accept if it signs onto a deal that maintains de facto Russian control of some of its territory.
“The essence of the whole deal hinges on two points: territory and security guarantees,” said a NATO diplomat.
Ukraine’s positions have been weakened by a high-level corruption scandal that engulfed Zelensky’s inner circle and swallowed up his longtime controversial adviser Andriy Yermak. Kyiv is also under severe financial pressure as direct U.S. funding has dried up, while European governments struggle to unlock new funds for Ukraine.
The Europeans, who have sought to sway the talks and retain their leverage, struck a deal early Wednesday designed to further reduce their dependency on Russian energy. The E.U. plan is to start banning Russian gas imports next year and bar them all by 2027. Europe’s imports of Russian gas dropped drastically after the 2022 invasion of Ukraine, but still represent about 19 percent of overall intake.
Russia, meanwhile, is also straining under war costs and declining oil revenue, with its newly approved three-year federal budget projecting a deficit.
Some analysts argued that the costs of waging the war for both Kyiv and Moscow are beginning to outweigh the political practicality of continuing it, providing the current U.S. effort with more of an opening to achieve a truce.
“Putin is not in the position of a person who wants peace at any cost, so for now he is only prepared to end the war on terms that suit him,” said Vladimir Pastukhov, a Russia expert and honorary professor at University College London.
“There is no reason to believe that the parties will take advantage of the window of opportunity that has arisen, but it is safe to say that they currently have one,” Pastukhov added in his Telegram blog post.
Tatiana Stanovaya, also of the Carnegie Center, said on X that Moscow’s main calculation in the talks with the U.S. is to get Washington to “pressure Kyiv to accept these terms as the only viable route to peace.”
Kostiantyn Khudov contributed to this report.
The post Confident of military success, Putin refuses compromise in Moscow talks appeared first on Washington Post.
