President Trump’s top envoy, Steve Witkoff, characterized his recent meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin as “compelling,” asserting that Putin appeared willing to pursue a lasting resolution to the ongoing conflict with Ukraine.
Witkoff held a private session with Putin in St. Petersburg last Friday, as part of Trump’s renewed diplomatic push to bring an end to the war that has raged for three years.
“I think we might be on the verge of something that would be very, very important for the world at large,” Witkoff told Fox News host Sean Hannity during a Monday interview. “It took a while for us to get to this place.”
Following what he described as five intense hours of dialogue, Witkoff said he could see a real opportunity for peace taking shape.
“This peace deal is about these so-called five territories, but there’s so much more to it,” he explained.
He also highlighted that beyond the territorial questions, there’s room to strengthen U.S.-Russia relations through mutually beneficial economic ventures that could help stabilize the region. “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.
This development followed Trump’s comments on Monday, where he assigned blame for the conflict to the current White House, calling the invasion “Biden’s war,” and implying that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky shared responsibility for the outbreak of hostilities.
“The War between Russia and Ukraine is Biden’s war, not mine. I just got here, and for four years during my term, had no problem in preventing it from happening,” Trump posted on Truth Social.
“President Putin, and everyone else, respected your President! I HAD NOTHING TO DO WITH THIS WAR, BUT AM WORKING DILIGENTLY TO GET THE DEATH AND DESTRUCTION TO STOP.”
In Moscow, Kremlin officials described the recent dialogue with Witkoff as constructive, though they clarified that the possibility of a summit between Trump and Putin had not been meaningfully addressed.
When asked whether a meeting between Trump and Putin was becoming more likely, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told state-run television that both countries were “walking along this path together very patiently,” but emphasized that reviving diplomatic relations would require considerable effort and caution.
He noted that organizing such a meeting “requires more work, requires more time.”
The revelations about the Putin-Witkoff talks came just after Zelensky made a direct appeal to Trump during an interview on “60 Minutes,” inviting him to visit Ukraine and witness the impact of the war firsthand.
“We want you to come,” Zelensky said.
“You think you understand what’s going on here. Okay, we respect your position. You understand. But, please, before any kind of decisions, any kind of forms of negotiations, come to see people, civilians, warriors, hospitals, churches, children destroyed or dead.”
“Come, look, and then let’s — let’s move with a plan how to finish the war,” he added.
{Matzav.com}