Two of President Donald Trump's senior envoys arrived in Moscow with a US peace proposal and will press both sides in Kyiv on Sunday. Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff met Russian officials in the capital on Saturday before a planned flight to Kyiv for talks with Ukrainian leaders.
Trump told reporters the pair were "bringing with them a proposal to end the war." They were pictured at Vnukovo Airport being greeted by Russian diplomat Kirill Dmitriev. Flight-tracking data showed a US government aircraft reached Moscow via Helsinki, where it had flown from the United States earlier in the day.
The visit will be the envoys' first trip to Kyiv, though they have flown to Moscow multiple times since Trump returned to office. They were expected to meet President Vladimir Putin and President Volodymyr Zelensky as part of a weekend push to accelerate negotiations that so far have produced no breakthrough.
Russian state media said Mr Putin ordered a three-day pause in strikes on Kyiv starting at midnight, a move presented as a concession linked to the envoys' visit. Kyiv reported a different pattern. President Zelensky said Russian attacks on airports in Kyiv and Boryspil were "demonstrative" strikes ahead of the US delegation's landing, and he warned those attacks were a reaction to preparations for an aircraft arriving in the capital.
Zelensky also said he would guarantee the safety of Russian airspace during the envoys' trip and urged Moscow to reciprocate for Ukraine. Ukraine reported an overnight strike on a civilian building in the Dnipro region that killed four people and injured five more, underscoring the risk still posed by ongoing hostilities.
The envoys' Moscow visit follows a rare trip to the capital last week by the head of the CIA, John Ratcliffe. There was no official comment from Washington or the Kremlin about what was discussed during that visit.
Negotiations remain stalled on core issues, including territorial control and security guarantees for Ukraine. With both sides intensifying aerial attacks in recent months, the envoys will face sharply divergent demands when they present Washington's proposal to Moscow and Kyiv. Their immediate task is to secure high-level meetings and test whether a US-brokered path to de-escalation can survive persistent mistrust and concrete military risks.
