Kushner Claims 'Meaningful Progress' as Ukraine Talks Widen to Europe

US special envoy Jared Kushner says the push to end the Russia-Ukraine war has produced “meaningful progress” — in understanding both sides’ concerns, identifying possible solutions and establishing a path forward. He and fellow US envoy Steve Witkoff travelled to Moscow for talks with Vladimir Putin, then on to Dublin to meet Volodymyr Zelensky. Those stops came after trilateral talks with Russian and Ukrainian delegations in Abu Dhabi.

Writing on X, Kushner said both sides have now agreed to widen the next round of negotiations to include European partners. That, he said, lets negotiators tackle broader postwar European security arrangements alongside the territorial questions between Ukraine and Russia. He argued lasting peace needs “credible security guarantees, deconfliction mechanisms, and reciprocal de-escalation commitments,” and said Washington is working on what would be the largest prisoner exchange of the war.

Zelensky, who met Witkoff and Kushner at the European Political Community summit in Dublin, said “diplomacy will remain active” and that further multilateral meetings are being prepared. In a social media post he said prisoners will be released and that Kyiv is counting on the biggest exchange since the war started. He added that European representatives are being drawn in more actively so they get “an equal seat at the negotiating table.”

More high-level talks are already pencilled in. Russian presidential aide Yuri Ushakov told reporters that Putin and Donald Trump are expected to keep discussing the war when they meet at the APEC summit in Shenzhen, China, on November 18 and 19. Ushakov also claimed Kyiv doesn’t want the war to end because it would have to announce general elections immediately.

Zelensky is running diplomacy on several tracks at once. He said he met Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk and thanked Poland for supporting Ukraine’s independence, with the talks centred on Russian strikes and on expanding Ukraine-Poland transport links for fuel supplies to keep energy flowing through winter. On the sidelines in Dublin, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni said she and British Prime Minister Andy Burnham discussed security and defence cooperation between their countries, UK-EU ties and the latest developments in Ukraine.