Adnkronos (Adnkronos) – The meeting in the Kremlin between Russian President Vladimir Putin and White House envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner lasted more than two hours, before they left Moscow, TASS reports. The American envoys called for Europe's involvement in the talks. There is "excellent coordination" between the United States and Europe on resolving the crisis in Ukraine, and "we hope that soon, perhaps after this meeting, we will be able to announce the date of the next trilateral meeting with the participation of representatives of the European Union," Witkoff said, meeting with the Kremlin leader in Moscow.
"The Europeans were physically present in the United Arab Emirates," where the latest round of trilateral negotiations took place, Witkoff explained. "Even though they weren't at the negotiating table, we consulted with them. We spoke with them and kept them updated on everything we were discussing," the White House envoy added.
Witkoff then conveyed to Putin the message of American President Donald Trump.
"He believes, and he asked us to communicate this to you, that it is very important to end this conflict as quickly as possible. This is a very difficult conflict for both sides," Witkoff said during the meeting with Putin. "We, as the United States, are doing everything we can," he added.
“Europeans must decide whether they want peace or war,” Putin said during the meeting, adding that Europeans know Russia's position: the deployment of foreigners in Ukraine is unacceptable, the Russian president reiterated.
Putin has proposed a new truce in Kostyantynivka to allow the 400-500 people who still live there to leave the town in the Donetsk region whose fall Moscow, contested by Kiev, announced last July.
"There's a settlement in Donbass called Kostyantynivka, where there are still about 400-500 civilians. Let's do as we did in Oleshky and invite representatives of the foreign press, including the American one," he said at the meeting with Witkoff and Kushner in the Kremlin.
It will take the Russian military five days to clear the area around the city of mines, he added, specifying that, as in Oleshky, the Russian and Ukrainian human rights ombudsmen, Yana Lantratova and Dmytro Lubinets, could coordinate the operation. Russian soldiers would be willing to guarantee the operation's security. "But if it's true, as the Ukrainians claim, that the city is under their control, they will do so."
According to analysts at the Institute for the Study of War, the Russians have recently consolidated their positions west of Konstyantynivka, where they are under fire from Ukrainian forces, and have conducted further infiltration missions into the city. "Ukrainian military sources emphasize that the densely populated territory and Russia's extensive use of infiltration tactics complicate efforts to pinpoint the exact positions of Russians and Ukrainians in the city and in Russian-controlled areas."
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