A senior Ukrainian official said a new round of talks with the United States got off to a constructive start, a huge relief for Kyiv after the extraordinarily public blowup between US President Donald Trump and Ukraine’s leader Volodymyr Zelensky less than two weeks ago.
Zelensky’s chief of staff Andriy Yermak, who is representing Ukraine at the talks in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, said Tuesday that “the meeting with the US team started very constructively.”
“We are working to bring about a just and lasting peace,” he added.
The Ukrainian delegation, which does not include Zelensky, was meeting with US Secretary of State Marco Rubio and National Security Adviser Mike Waltz. Both Rubio and Waltz attended direct talks with Russia last month.
As the meeting entered its fourth hour, Rubio and Waltz were seen walking through the lobby at the Ritz-Carlton hotel in Jeddah where talks were underway between US and Ukraine officials.
Speaking before the meeting, Rubio said the US wanted to get more details on Kyiv’s position and what possible concessions Ukraine would be willing to make, adding that the US was “in listening mode.”
Yermak on Tuesday declined to outline what, if any, compromises his country could offer to get to a peace deal. He said that security guarantees from the US were “very important” so that Russia cannot repeat its aggression.
The issue of security guarantees is one of the key sticking points between the US and Ukraine. Kyiv has long said that any ceasefire or peace deal must be underpinned by Western security guarantees because history shows that Russian President Vladimir Putin does not stick to agreements that don’t include them.
Many of Ukraine’s Western allies have backed Kyiv on this point, but the Trump administration has so far refused to make any concrete commitments.
Speaking at the European Parliament on Tuesday, president of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen said there was “the urgent need to fill the gaps in Ukraine’s military supplies and to provide Ukraine with solid security guarantees.”
“Putin has proven time and again that he is a hostile neighbor. He cannot be trusted, he can only be deterred,” she said.
Yermak seemed to acknowledge that security guarantees might not be on the agenda on Tuesday, stressing to reporters that finding a way to get the peace process started was the priority for the meeting.
“Now we think it’s necessary to discuss the most important: how to start this process,” Yermak told reporters in the lobby of Jeddah’s Ritz-Carlton hotel before the meeting. “And we’re very open, very open. And we want to have very constructive, deep, friend, partners conversation with our American partners.”
The Ukrainian and American officials met in Jeddah just hours after Russia said it was hit by a “massive” Ukrainian drone attack. Moscow’s defense ministry said it had downed 337 drones it claimed Ukraine had fired at Russia, of which 91 had targeted the Moscow region. Local officials said three people were killed and at least six wounded.
If the figure is confirmed, the aerial attacks would represent one of the largest on Russia since its invasion of Ukraine, and a clear attempt to show strength on the part of Kyiv.
Rubio asks Ukraine for concessions
The meeting on Tuesday was the first time Ukrainian and American officials have met since the US paused all shipments of military aid to Ukraine following the disastrous meeting between Trump and Zelensky less than two weeks ago.
Zelensky has since described the fiery meeting as “regrettable” and said Ukraine was ready to negotiate over an end to the conflict. However, he stopped short of apologizing to Trump.
Speaking ahead of the meeting on Tuesday, Rubio did not specify what compromises he was looking for from Ukraine, but Trump has repeatedly suggested Ukraine would likely need to give up some of its territory. Ukraine has so far not indicated it would be willing to do that.
Russian forces currently occupy nearly 20% of Ukraine’s territory, up from the roughly 7% Moscow controlled before it launched its unprovoked full-scale invasion in February 2022. Some 6 million Ukrainians live under Russian occupation.
Putin has made clear that he wants Moscow to gain control over the entirety of Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions.
According to the Institute for the Study of War, a US-based conflict monitor, Russia currently occupies about 99% of the Luhansk region and 70% of the Donetsk region, as well as roughly 75% of both the Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions.