Russian invasion Negotiations

Kremlin: Putin to meet Trump envoy next week

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov has given a more precise date for the meeting between Vladimir Putin and US envoy Steve Witkoff in Moscow, Sky News reports.

– In the first half of next week. We will announce the date in due course, he says.

Many eyes will be on Moscow during the meeting after The Telegraph reported sources that the US will then recognize the occupied Ukrainian regions of Donetsk, Luhansk and Crimea as Russian.

According to the information, Trump will send Witkoff and his son-in-law Jared Kushner to Moscow to personally inform Putin of the decision.

Sources: Headlines gave Europe a boost – rushed to fly to Geneva

European countries were caught off guard when several media outlets last week published information that the United States had drawn up a peace proposal that would entail major concessions for Ukraine, writes the New York Times.

Diplomats from Europe are said to have known that the White House was working on a plan but did not know that it would be to Russia's advantage. German Chancellor Friedrich Merz did not receive any information directly from the United States but was reached by the information through headlines, and his staff is said to have made several attempts to arrange a phone call with Donald Trump.

European leaders who were at the G20 summit in South Africa gathered and quickly realized that they needed to travel to Geneva where US Secretary of State Marco Rubio was. Just half an hour after the joint statement was published, diplomats rushed to the airport to get to Switzerland as quickly as possible.

The peace negotiations — that's the point

• The US and Russia secretly developed a 28-point peace plan for Ukraine, which included Ukraine giving up all of Donbas and severely limiting its army.
• The plan met strong criticism from Ukraine and European countries, who believed that it effectively meant a Ukrainian capitulation and met Russia's demands.
• After negotiations in Geneva, the US and Ukraine agreed on a new draft with 19 points, in which the most difficult issues of territory and NATO were left to the presidential level.
• In parallel, Europe has developed its own counter-proposal demanding NATO-like security guarantees for Ukraine.
• New talks have been held in Abu Dhabi, while Moscow continues to demand Ukrainian withdrawal from areas in eastern Ukraine occupied by Russia.