US envoys hold ‘substantive’ talks with Zelenskyy in first visit to Kyiv

United States special envoys Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff have held discussions with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on ending Russia's war against his country, marking their first visit to Kyiv since the full-scale Russian invasion in February 2022.

Key points

• The Russian Defence Ministry remarked it had shot down 400 drones previously 24 hours, according to the Interfax news agency.
• The Ukraine Air Force remarked Russia had attacked overnight with 108 drones and missiles.
• The session on Sunday came a day after the two met Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow.
• Earlier, Zelenskyy published a video of himself session Trump's envoys in central Kyiv, saying, "Talks have begun."
• While Witkoff and Kushner have visited Moscow eight times, they have never held discussions in Kyiv until now.

For context, the session on Sunday came a day after the two met Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow.

"It is particularly notable that the delegation has arrived to see us. We have been waiting a long time for Steve and Jared, Witkoff and Kushner, " Zelenskyy said, thanking US President Donald Trump for "allowing them to come" despite the war.

After the session, Witkoff stated the US team had been "very encouraged" by what he described as a "substantive, important" discussion.

On his part, Kushner remarked Trump wanted "not just to figure out how we end the current war, but how do we create the right conditions and arrangements for a long-term, durable peace".

Ukraine's top security authorities and negotiators were additionally present, along with a number of European national security advisers. Zelenskyy remarked Europeans would participate in some of the negotiations with the US envoys.

"We are expecting one session of our discussions, and then another session will be held with the European NSAs. A number of notable sessions, " he noted.

Meanwhile, the US envoys arrived in the Ukrainian capital by train from Poland, hoping to revive negotiations to end Europe's worst conflict since World War II after a summer of heightened tensions. While Witkoff and Kushner have visited Moscow eight times, they have never held discussions in Kyiv until now.

Zelenskyy took the US envoys to see Kyiv's historic Saint Sophia's Cathedral. It sits opposite the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) security building that was hit by a Russian drone on Friday.

Moscow's four-and-a-half-year invasion of Ukraine has killed hundreds of thousands of individuals and displaced millions.

Previous rounds of US-mediated peace discussions encouraged by Trump. This person campaigned on a promise to swiftly end the war, have yielded few results. Though he did not elaborate, he suggested on Friday that the US had a fresh proposal.

Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov described Saturday's session in Moscow. It ran more than three hours, as "highly useful", while a White House official informed the Reuters news agency that the next steps would be confirmed in the coming weeks.

Though he provided no details, ushakov called the discussions "extremely frank", saying the US team "put forward a number of ideas on possible routes to a settlement".

In televised comments before those discussions, Putin stated Russia would ensure the safety of the envoys while in Kyiv. "We will do everything that depends on us to ensure the safety of the negotiation process and mediators such as yourselves, " Putin informed Witkoff and Kushner.

Earlier on Saturday, Putin had thanked Trump for persisting in his efforts to end the war despite it being "not simple".

Trump remarked again on Friday that his envoys were bringing a "proposal" to end the fighting. "We have an idea for peace, " he remarked, without elaborating.

US efforts have so far failed to bring regarding a breakthrough in the war, in part as of the US-Israeli war on Iran.

Meanwhile, Russia has occupied sizeable swathes of eastern and southern Ukraine, and Putin has insisted Moscow is intent on seizing the rest of the east.

In previous discussions, the two sides have remained far apart on a range of key matters, including the future of Ukraine's eastern regions of Luhansk and Donetsk. Russia has demanded Ukraine's withdrawal from an entrenched belt of towns that it still controls there, but Kyiv has refused, reckoning it can still hold out for years.

For Ukraine, hard security guarantees from its European allies and the US are crucial to deter Russia from invading again. No strikes on capitals.

Both Russia and Ukraine have pledged not to strike each other's capital for three days around the US team's visit. Yet despite the ceasefire agreement for the two cities, fighting continued elsewhere.

For context, the Ukraine Air Force remarked Russia had attacked overnight with 108 drones and missiles. It additionally stated on Sunday that it had struck the Ryazan oil refinery, regarding 480km (298 miles) inside Russia, overnight, causing a fire.

Meanwhile, the Russian Defence Ministry remarked it had shot down 400 drones previously 24 hours, according to the Interfax news agency.

As well as drone storage sites, it continued that strikes were carried out during the day on Ukrainian infrastructure facilities employed by the country's armed forces.

For now, US envoys hold 'substantive' talks with Zelenskyy in first visit to Kyiv remains the part of the story worth watching, and further updates are likely as more details are confirmed.