Trilateral talks between Ukraine, Russia and the United States aimed at ending the war in Ukraine have begun in Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates.
Expectations of a breakthrough are low. US officials said on Monday that Moscow and Kyiv were privately showing "a little bit of flexibility" on the question of who would control Ukraine's eastern regions after the war.
Jared Kushner, Donald Trump's son-in-law and part of the US delegation alongside peace envoy Steve Witkoff, said the talks would focus on the "postwar security concerns" of both Russia and Ukraine. "An important part of this process is encouraging all parties to begin thinking seriously about what comes after the war," he wrote on X.
A key disagreement concerns Donetsk, which is now mostly occupied by Russia. Moscow has demanded that Ukraine relinquish the parts it still holds. Kyiv wants to freeze the contact line to keep control of those areas, which it says are crucial to its future security. Neither side has budged publicly. A US official said the issue could not be solved before a new "security architecture" for the post-war period is agreed.
The proposed framework includes security consultations, crisis communication hotlines and "reciprocal de-escalation measures". Officials also floated reactivating the NATO-Russia Council, which has been largely paused since 2022.
European officials are wary of Russia seeking a deal with the US on future collective security without them. French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot said France, the UK and Germany "will indeed be in the meeting room". The US official said the Americans would propose moving to a multilateral format that brings in the Europeans, adding: "Hopefully we'll get the Russians on board."
The last round of trilateral talks, held in Geneva in February, ended without a breakthrough. Soon after, the US-Israel war on Iran diverted Washington's attention from Ukraine, and no other discussions were held.
Russia's delegation includes Kremlin aide Vladimir Medinsky, deputy foreign ministers Sergei Ryabkov and Mikhail Galuzin, spy chief Igor Kostyukov and army general Yury Zhigarlovsky. Ukraine's team includes Foreign Intelligence Service head Rustem Umerov, President Volodymyr Zelensky's chief of staff Kyrylo Budanov and MP Davyd Arakhamiya.
The talks come as Ukraine reels from a deadly Russian strike on a village in Zaporizhzhia last week that killed at least 50 people. Kushner cautioned on Monday that the talks could at most "build momentum toward the next phase of negotiations".
Source: BBC
