U.S. envoy Steve Witkoff to hold talks with Zelenskyy and European leaders in Berlin

U.S. special envoy Steve Witkoff is on his way to Berlin, Germany, to meet with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and European leaders for peace negotiations aimed at ending the war in Ukraine, a senior White House official told NBC News.

Witkoff has led negotiations with Ukraine and Russia since President Donald Trump took office in January, but numerous high-level meetings between the United States and the two warring countries have yet to produce results because disagreements remain over the content of a peace plan.

Trump, who insisted a deal be reached by Christmas, signaled his patience was running out.

European leaders have focused on how to support Ukraine in the event of a peace deal, with talks underway on security guarantees and financing. But longtime U.S. allies in Europe have struggled to balance growing pressure from Washington with their reluctance to give in to Russia’s uncompromising demands.

Zelensky said Ukraine submitted a 20-point plan to the United States on Wednesday, aiming to balance a U.S.-backed 28-point plan whose original version was considered too favorable to Moscow.

Ukraine’s proposal included separate documents on security guarantees, to prevent Russia from attacking again, and on the reconstruction of war-affected Ukrainian cities.

The issue of ceding territory remains a major sticking point in the negotiations, and Russian President Vladimir Putin last week reiterated his goal of taking eastern Ukraine “by force” unless his unwavering demands are met.

Zelensky said there was still no consensus on the land issue and that Ukrainians would have to vote on any territorial concessions in a referendum.

Russia has continued its bombing of Ukraine as negotiations continue. The southern Ukrainian port city of Odessa and surrounding areas suffered major power outages on Saturday after a widespread Russian overnight attack on the power grid across the country.

Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant also temporarily lost all off-site electricity overnight for the 12th time, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said on Saturday, citing its director general Rafael Mariano Grossi.

Zelensky said in a post on

Witkoff’s visit to Berlin comes as the European Union agreed on Friday to indefinitely freeze Russian assets worth 210 billion euros ($246 billion) held in Europe, as it plans to use the assets to finance Ukraine’s war effort.

The indefinite freeze appears to be an attempt to convince Belgium, where much of this money is held at Euroclear, to agree to plans that would lend much of the money to Ukraine to cover its military and civilian budgetary needs in 2026 and 2027.

Belgium has opposed the plan because it fears legal retaliation from Russia, which has condemned the freezing of its assets as theft, but the deal includes a guarantee that Belgium would not be left alone to foot the bill if a possible Russian lawsuit is successful.

Zelensky said Thursday that negotiators were grappling with the issue of territorial possession in U.S.-led peace talks to end the war with Russia, including the future of eastern Ukraine’s Donetsk region and the Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, one of the world’s 10 largest nuclear power plants.

Speaking to reporters in kyiv on Friday, Zelensky said the United States was proposing, as a compromise, the creation of a “free economic zone” in parts of eastern Donbass controlled by Ukraine, which Russia demanded Ukraine cede.

Among the points shared by Zelensky is that Russia wants to incorporate all of Donbas, something Ukraine opposes. He also said the United States was proposing to transform Donbass into a “free economic zone.” This would mean that Ukrainian forces would withdraw from Donbass and Russia would refrain from entering parts of Donbass that it does not currently occupy.

“They see it as the withdrawal of Ukrainian troops from the Donetsk region, and the compromise is supposed to be that Russian troops will not enter this part of the Donetsk region. They don’t know who will govern this territory,” he said, adding that Russia refers to it as a “demilitarized zone.”

NATO chief Mark Rutte struck a drastic note Thursday in urging allies to step up their defense efforts. “We are Russia’s next target,” he said, warning of a conflict that could have “the scale of the war that our grandparents and great-grandparents endured.”