A meeting between US Special Envoy Steve Witkoff and President Vladimir Putin has begun in Moscow, the Kremlin has announced, as the US pushes a plan to end the war in Ukraine.
"A meeting between Russian President Vladimir Putin and US Special Envoy Steven Witkoff has begun in the Kremlin," the Kremlin said on its Telegram account late on Thursday.
Russian state news agencies reported that President Donald Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner was also in the meeting, as well as Russian negotiator Kirill Dmitriev and Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov.
The meeting in Moscow follows the meeting in Davos on Thursday between Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
The US President said he had a “very good” meeting with Zelenskyy, suggesting fresh momentum towards ending the war.
“I had a very good meeting with President Zelenskyy. Everybody wants to have the war end,” Trump said following the talk on Thursday.
The hour-long session in Davos, Switzerland, on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum comes as the US administration intensifies its diplomatic efforts across both sides of the front lines.
Zelenskyy also described the talks as “good” and said Ukrainian and Russian delegations would hold their first trilateral meetings with US officials in the UAE.
The discussions are expected to take place on Friday and Saturday.
Witkoff said he held productive talks in Davos with Ukrainian negotiators.
Witkoff and Kushner also met on Tuesday with Kirill Dmitriev, head of Russia’s sovereign wealth fund and President Vladimir Putin’s economic envoy, who has played a central role in efforts to end the war in Ukraine.
Witkoff and Kushner last travelled to Moscow in December, where they met Putin for five hours at the Kremlin.
