Vladimir Putin held talks with US Special Envoy Steve Witkoff and US President Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner on Thursday night, which Kremlin aide Yury Ushakov described as “exceptionally substantive” and “extremely frank” on Friday.
Ushakov also confirmed that Moscow had agreed to attend the first meeting between Russia, the US and Ukraine since the start of the war, which is due to take place in Abu Dhabi later on Friday, according to state-affiliated business daily Kommersant.
Ushakov said Putin had given instructions to the Russian delegation following his meeting with Witkoff and Kushner, Kommersant continued, adding that Russia would be represented by Igor Kostyukov, the head of the GRU, Russia’s military intelligence agency. Witkoff and Russian Special Envoy Kirill Dmitriev are also expected to meet in Abu Dhabi on Friday as part of a bilateral working group on economic affairs.
During their three-hour Kremlin meeting, Putin and Witkoff agreed that there could be no long-term solution to the war in Ukraine until territorial issues were resolved, Ushakov said, adding that, until then, Russia would continue to “meet the objectives of the special military operation on the battlefield”.
The two sides also discussed the $5 billion worth of Russian assets frozen in the US, with Ushakov suggesting that $1 billion could be used as Moscow’s contribution towards Trump’s Board of Peace, which was officially launched in Davos on Thursday to coordinate the reconstruction of post-war Gaza, while the remainder could be used to finance reconstruction efforts in Ukraine once a peace agreement had been settled.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky announced the surprise three-way talks in Abu Dhabi following his own speech at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland on Thursday, which he had attended following a last-minute schedule change in order to meet Trump in person.
