Witkoff Calls Talks With Zelensky Encouraging

Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, sent to Kyiv by President Trump, met Sunday with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky for talks that Witkoff later pronounced encouraging. Zelensky said his country's goal is a "just, fair peace" that would prevent Russia from later resuming attacks, CBS News reports. Witkoff and Kushner had met the day before in Moscow with Russian President Vladimir Putin, and Zelensky said a session later Sunday would include national security advisers from Britain, France, and Germany. Much of the first discussion centered on how to get Ukrainians through the coming winter, a senior Ukrainian official said.

Kushner said that Trump wants not only to stop the war but to lock in a lasting settlement and that the envoys want to revive talks involving Russia and Ukraine directly, which hasn't happened in about six months. A follow-up meeting involving Ukraine, the US, and Europe was agreed to, Zelenksy said, per the AP. At the Vatican, Pope Leo XIV urged that the renewed talks "bear concrete fruit" and open the door to diplomacy.