Will Trump succeed in restarting Russia-Ukraine peace talks?
The Witkoff-Kushner visit to Moscow and Kyiv did not produce a breakthrough, but it can help begin a new process.
The visit by White House envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner to Moscow and Kyiv has left more questions than answers. Details of what was discussed in both meetings are scant, but all participants seem to describe them as “positive”.
It is indeed a positive development that US President Donald Trump is trying to jump start negotiations at this point. The biggest problem he faces is that Russia’s position has only hardened.
Russia wants Ukraine to be genuinely neutral, with no Western military presence, open or clandestine. It wants to keep previously occupied territories and it insists that Ukraine withdraw from the small part of Donbas that remains in its hands.
Others claimed Ratcliffe was trying to convey the “tide is turning” narrative to Putin and push for new negotiations based on that. The Atlantic magazine claimed last month that it was the CIA director who planted the idea that Russia was beginning to lose into Trump’s head during golf games.