U.S. and Russia hold new talks as Ukraine hopes to finalize peace deal
The United States is holding meetings with a Russian delegation in Abu Dhabi, two U.S. officials told NBC News, as Ukraine said it hoped to finalize a peace deal with President Donald Trump this week after securing changes to the plan.
A U.S. official told NBC News that “the Ukrainians have accepted the peace agreement,” adding that there were “some minor details to be worked out,” without providing further details. Kyiv has not publicly accepted any deal.
The Kremlin has said it is awaiting a modified proposal, and U.S. and Ukrainian officials have not said what Russia’s position might be.
Vladimir Putin has stuck to his hard line throughout months of stop-start diplomacy with Washington, and the plan released last week was initially seen across Europe as granting the Kremlin its key demands at the expense of Ukraine and its allies. Any new concessions to kyiv could be unacceptable to Moscow.
Army Secretary Dan Driscoll met for the first time with the Russian delegation in the UAE capital Monday evening and is expected to hold more meetings Tuesday, officials said.
“The talks are going well and we remain optimistic,” Lt. Col. Jeff Tolbert, an Army spokesman, said in a statement. “Secretary Driscoll is working closely with the White House and U.S. interagency agencies as these negotiations progress,” he said.
A Ukrainian delegation is also in Abu Dhabi and Driscoll is in contact with those officials, according to Tolbert.
Even as the two warring sides exchanged deadly strikes overnight, a senior Ukrainian official said President Volodymyr Zelensky could soon travel to the United States and meet with Trump to reach a deal.
The White House said Monday that no meetings were planned.
The Ukrainian and American delegations reached “common agreement on the basic terms of the agreement discussed in Geneva,” Rustem Umerov, a senior official in Zelensky’s government, said in a message published Tuesday morning, without elaborating on the details.
He added: “We look forward to organizing a visit by the Ukrainian president to the United States as early as possible in November to finalize the final steps and reach an agreement with President Trump.”
Zelensky said Tuesday that the Ukrainian team returned from Geneva with “an updated framework” of the peace plan. He said earlier that the plan now contained fewer points than the 28 initially released last week, adding that he still needed to discuss the “most sensitive issues” with Trump.
Just days ago, Zelensky warned that his country faced an extremely difficult week, with pressure to accept a deal forcing his country to choose between its “dignity” and a “key partner.”
But it has since reflected the optimism expressed by the United States after high-stakes negotiations.
Driscoll and senior Army leaders met for the first time with Ukrainian leaders in kyiv late last week.
NBC News reported that Driscoll attended another meeting with Ukraine this weekend in Geneva, which included Secretary of State and National Security Advisor Marco Rubio, special envoy Steve Witkoff and Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner.
Driscoll flew from Geneva to Abu Dhabi on Monday morning and is now the top U.S. official in the negotiations with Russia.
Moscow has publicly claimed that it has not received an official version of the peace plan.
“We still have nothing to say,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Tuesday, when asked about the Abu Dhabi meetings first reported by the Financial Times newspaper.
“We have communication channels with our American colleagues and they are used,” Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov told reporters on Tuesday. “And we expect them to present a version that they consider interim to complete the coordination phase of this text with the Europeans and the Ukrainians.”
Ukraine and European leaders rushed to respond to the plan last week, fearing that kyiv would be forced into concessions that would embolden Putin.
French President Emmanuel Macron said Tuesday that Trump’s plan was going in the right direction, but that some aspects still needed to be discussed and improved.
“We want peace, but we do not want a peace that would be capitulation,” he said.
Meanwhile, civilian casualties were reported on both sides as Russia continued its war.
In kyiv, Ukrainian officials said at least seven people were killed and 13 others injured in a Russian attack that caused damage and falling debris in 13 different neighborhoods in the capital.
Russian officials said three people were killed and ten others injured in an overnight air attack blamed on Ukraine in the town of Taganrog in the Rostov border region.
