United States President, Donald Trump’s special envoy announced Monday that Russian President Vladimir Putin appeared receptive to a “permanent peace” agreement with Ukraine.
According to AFP, the statement came following high-level diplomatic engagements aimed at resolving the war that has persisted for over three years.
Although Trump has consistently urged both Moscow and Kyiv to implement a ceasefire, the U.S. has yet to secure any significant commitments from the Kremlin, even after numerous rounds of talks involving American and Russian representatives.
Last Friday, special envoy Steve Witkoff held a meeting with Putin in Saint Petersburg, their third discussion since Trump, a Republican, resumed office in January.
In a Monday interview aired on Fox News, Witkoff expressed optimism about the prospects of a peace deal, noting the participation of senior Russian officials Yuri Ushakov and Kirill Dmitriev in what he described as a “compelling meeting.”
“Putin’s request is to get to have a permanent peace here. So beyond the ceasefire, we got an answer to that,” Witkoff said, while conceding that “it took a while for us to get to this place.”
“I think we might be on the verge of something that would be very, very important for the world at large,” he added.
According to Witkoff, commercial cooperation was also a feature of the ongoing dialogue between the two nations.
“I believe there’s a possibility to reshape the Russian-United States relationship through some very compelling commercial opportunities, that I think give real stability to the region too,” he said.
Nevertheless, despite a wave of diplomatic activity, Trump’s ambition to secure a lasting ceasefire in Ukraine remains unrealized.
Just last month, Putin turned down a joint ceasefire proposal put forward by the U.S. and Ukraine, while the Kremlin has insisted that a truce in the Black Sea region would depend on the West easing specific sanctions.
