U.S. envoy Steve Witkoff held a four-hour meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin in St. Petersburg on Friday, amid growing pressure from Donald Trump, who publicly called on Moscow to accelerate efforts toward a ceasefire in Ukraine.
According to the Kremlin, the meeting focused on resolving the Ukraine conflict, marking Witkoff’s third discussion with Putin this year. Russian special envoy Kirill Dmitriev described the talks as “productive.”
Trump, meanwhile, voiced frustration on social media:
“Russia has to get moving. Too many people are DYING, thousands a week, in a terrible and senseless war.”
The meeting follows controversy surrounding Keith Kellogg, Trump’s Ukraine envoy, who was quoted by The Times suggesting that British and French forces might control western Ukraine while Russian troops remain in the east, likening the scenario to post-WWII Berlin.
Kellogg later denied this interpretation, writing on X:
“I was NOT referring to a partitioning of Ukraine. I meant a post-ceasefire resilience force supporting Ukraine’s sovereignty.”
No official responses came from the White House or Kyiv, though the BBC has sought clarification from The Times.
Earlier in the day, European countries pledged €21 billion ($24 billion) in military assistance for Ukraine. European defense leaders said they saw no immediate end to the war in sight.
Before the Putin-Witkoff meeting, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov warned against expecting major breakthroughs, saying the normalization of U.S.-Russia relations is ongoing. He also did not rule out a future Trump-Putin meeting, depending on Witkoff’s proposals.
Witkoff also met with Kirill Dmitriev, head of Russia’s sovereign wealth fund, at a local business forum. Dmitriev had recently traveled to Washington, the most senior Russian official to do so since Russia’s full-scale invasion began in 2022.
Elsewhere, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky visited the site of a recent missile strike in Kryvyi Rih—his hometown—where 19 people, including nine children, were killed.
Zelensky accused the Kremlin of deliberately prolonging the conflict and alleged that hundreds of Chinese nationals are fighting for Russia, citing recent captures of two Chinese fighters.
“Russia is prolonging the war, even using Chinese lives to do it,” he said, calling again for more air defense systems.
He added that Ukraine is willing to purchase additional systems and noted this was discussed with President Trump.
Trump has repeatedly claimed he could end the war in 24 hours and insisted the invasion wouldn’t have happened had he been president in 2022:
“A war that never should have happened, and wouldn’t have happened, if I were President!!!”
In February, U.S. and Russian officials held their first direct talks since the invasion in Saudi Arabia, and discussions to restore diplomatic ties are ongoing.
Despite tense relations, Washington and Moscow completed a prisoner swap this week. Russian-American Ksenia Karelina, jailed for donating to a Ukrainian charity, was exchanged for Arthur Petrov, a German-Russian national accused of exporting sensitive electronics to Russia’s military sector.
Russian Ambassador to the UK Andrei Kelin told the BBC that U.S.-Russia relations remain strained, stating:
“You can’t go from total distrust to alignment in two months. But we are working on the differences step by step.”
