Moscow, Sept. 5 (SANA) Russian President Vladimir Putin met on Saturday with U.S. envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner in Moscow to discuss American mediation efforts to end the Russia-Ukraine war.
The meeting marks the sixth such encounter between Putin and the U.S. negotiators since mediated negotiations on a settlement began. Russian presidential aide Yury Ushakov and presidential envoy Kirill Dmitriev also attended.
Putin said all components and aspects of the conflict were discussed, expressing Moscow’s satisfaction with working alongside Witkoff and Kushner. “The quality of the mediation and the trust in its practitioners is extremely important,” Putin said, according to RT.
Putin praises Trump’s efforts
Putin praised U.S. President Donald Trump’s efforts, saying: “I understand that he is in a difficult situation overall, yet he does not stop his attempts to reach a settlement and contribute to resolving the Russian-Ukrainian conflict.”
Putin ordered a halt to all airstrikes on Kyiv for three days, starting at midnight, in a move tied to the U.S. envoys’ contacts in Kyiv. He said Ukraine had also significantly reduced the intensity of its strikes on Russian territory since that time.
“A ceasefire has been agreed upon through official channels of the security services,” Putin said, describing it as a “partial” truce. He noted that Ukrainian authorities had published their own call for a broader three-day truce, but Moscow had not discussed that directly with the Ukrainian side.
US envoys to visit Kyiv Sunday
Witkoff thanked Putin for agreeing to a three-day ceasefire while he and Kushner visit Moscow and Kyiv. The U.S. envoys are expected to travel to the Ukrainian capital on Sunday to meet with President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
Trump said on Friday that Kushner and Witkoff would travel to Moscow with “a proposal to end the war,” without providing further details.
The meeting comes amid intensified diplomatic efforts to make progress on the Ukraine file, with diplomatic efforts stalled since February, when the U.S.-Israeli military operation against Iran began.
On Friday, Trump said there “may be a good chance” of reaching a deal, while the Kremlin expressed less optimism, with Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov suggesting that “the US administration must take into account the realities on the ground”.
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