Witkoff and Kushner leave Kyiv with no deal and a bid to revive three-way talks

Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner spent Saturday afternoon in the Kremlin and Sunday in Kyiv. They left both capitals talking about momentum and produced no settlement. The useful facts from the weekend sit in the pauses, the format they want next, and the subjects Zelensky was willing to name in public.

The Moscow session lasted three hours and was followed by dinner, according to a Kremlin briefing. Aide Yuri Ushakov said the Americans offered "a whole series of considerations regarding possible paths to a settlement" and promised to carry Putin's assessments to Zelensky. Putin ordered a three-day halt to Russian strikes on Kyiv to cover the US visit. He stressed that neither side had agreed a wider ceasefire.

Zelensky answered on Saturday with a matching offer: Ukraine would refrain from strikes on Moscow through Monday if Russia did the same for Kyiv. The envoys arrived in the Ukrainian capital by train. Talks ran more than four hours, first at the St Sophia Cathedral complex, then at Mariinsky Palace. National security advisers from Britain, France and Germany joined the final of three rounds.

Zelensky called the conversation "very substantive." He said the agenda included air defence, specifically Patriot systems, and a winter package covering both missiles and energy infrastructure. He said a strong Ukrainian army remained "one of the main guarantees of security." Territorial questions came up. About three quarters of the Donetsk region is under Russian control. Zelensky has refused to cede it. He said territory should be discussed "at the level of leaders."

Kushner told reporters the United States wants to return to a trilateral format that last sat about six months ago, before Washington's attention shifted to the war with Iran. He said direct three-way talks spare the United States from speaking for either capital. Witkoff said the team had heard "new ideas" in Moscow, did not list them, and hoped a new round would be announced "in short order." He described the US goal as "a diplomatic resolution to this conflict, not a kinetic resolution."

The press conference in Kyiv was not gentle. Ukrainian journalist Dmitry Gordon asked Witkoff whether Putin had been deceiving him and whether he found it distasteful to sit with a man Gordon called a war criminal. Witkoff defended the relationship as a requirement of communication. Kushner answered a question about pressure on Moscow by talking about a settlement in which both sides could claim a result.

The war is in its fifth year of full-scale fighting. Zelensky has said a window exists before the next US presidential campaign in 2028. That calendar is now part of the negotiation. So is winter. Russian strikes on the power grid are expected again. The Patriot numbers and the energy kit Zelensky asked for are the immediate price of keeping the lights on while talks continue.

Ukrzaliznytsia, the state railway, said the American party had left Kyiv on Monday. No date or city was set for the follow-up meeting Zelensky said would include Ukraine, the United States and Europe. Until that meeting is booked, the weekend's harvest is a 72-hour hush over two capitals and a public argument about whether talking to Putin is a method or a concession.