Putin's envoy to meet with Trump team in Florida ahead of Abu Dhabi peace talks, White House confirms
Kremlin negotiator Kirill Dmitriev will meet with members of the Trump administration in Florida on Jan. 31, a White House official confirmed to the Kyiv Independent on Jan. 30.
The Russia-U.S. talks come a day before Kyiv and Moscow are set to hold their next round of peace negotiations on Feb. 1 in Abu Dhabi.
Dmitriev will meet with administration officials on Jan. 31, though the names of the U.S. delegates have not been disclosed. Previously, Special Envoy Steve Witkoff and U.S. President Donald Trump's son-in-law, Jared Kushner, have headed the U.S. negotiating team.
Dmitriev is the head of the Russian Direct Investment Fund and the Kremlin's chief economic negotiator. He has played a key role in Moscow's outreach to Washington, architecting the initial U.S.-backed 28-point peace plan that demanded sweeping concessions from Ukraine.
Dmitriev also took part in the most recent trilateral peace talks held Jan. 23-24 in Abu Dhabi. Those talks are set to continue on Feb. 1 — the same day Russia claims as the deadline for its pause in attacks against Kyiv.
While Trump on Jan. 29 announced that he'd convinced Russian President Vladimir Putin to stop bombarding Ukrainian cities for a week, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said the next day that the truce only extended to Kyiv, and would only last til Feb. 1.
President Volodymyr Zelensky also acknowledged on Jan. 30 that the date of the next round of peace talks could be delayed due to the developing situation between the U.S. and Iran.
Recent days saw renewed tensions in the Middle East as U.S. President Donald Trump is reportedly again weighing strikes against Iran following weeks of violent crackdown against anti-regime protests.
The talks in Abu Dhabi center on a possible energy ceasefire and control over Ukraine's Donbas region.
Russia has long demanded that Ukraine cede the entirety of Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts, including unoccupied territory, as a precondition of any peace agreement. Control over the territory is still the major point of contention in negotiations, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said at a congressional hearing on Jan. 28.
The issue is "a bridge we haven't crossed," Rubio said.
