Donald Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff has praised Russian president Vladimir Putin as “super smart”, as talks over a ceasefire in Ukraine get underway in Saudi Arabia.
Ahead of Sunday’s discussions in Riyadh, Mr Witkoff – a former real estate mogul tasked by Mr Trump with leading negotiations on Ukraine’s future – met with Mr Putin in Moscow for a second time on Thursday for talks on ending the war.
Speaking to far-right commentator Tucker Carlson in an interview broadcast on Friday, Mr Witkoff said he “liked” the Russian president, who he described as “gracious”. He added: “I don’t regard Putin as a bad guy. He’s super smart.”
In remarks that will do little to assuage European fears that the White House is increasingly parroting Kremlin propaganda, Mr Witkoff claimed the “elephant in the room” in peace talks is whether Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelensky can acknowledge Moscow’s claimed right to Crimea and four “Russian-speaking” regions in eastern Ukraine.
Despite being unable to name two of the four mainland regions – which Mr Putin partly occupies, and attempted to illegally annex following sham referenda in September 2022 – and using the Russian name for a third, Mr Witkoff said he believed the “central issue” in the conflict was whether Ukraine would relent control of them to Moscow.
Claiming an “overwhelming majority” of residents in the contested regions had indicated a preference for Russian rule, despite reports of ballots being cast at gunpoint, Mr Witkoff went on to claim that “the Russians are de facto in control of these territories”.
Many thousands of Ukrainians have given their lives to defend territory in Donetsk and Luhansk since 2014, and in Zaporizhzhia and Kherson since Russia’s full-scale invasion three years ago. While Moscow currently controls most of Donetsk and Luhansk, they hold minimal territory in Zaporizhzhia and Kherson, with fierce fighting still ongoing in all four regions.
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Mr Witkoff’s comments came shortly before Ukrainian delegates travelled to Riyadh for talks with US officials on Sunday, with Russian representatives due to follow suit in separate talks on Monday – in the first such parallel negotiations since the early days of Russia’s full-scale invasion.
The Kremlin said its main focus in Riyadh would be a resumption of the UN-brokered shipping deal in the Black Sea, which Russia unilaterally pulled out of months after it was struck in July 2022.
Insisting that he believes Mr Putin “wants peace”, Mr Witkoff told Fox News on Sunday: “I think that you’re going to see in Saudi Arabia on Monday some real progress, particularly as it affects a Black Sea ceasefire on ships between both countries.
“And from that, you’ll naturally gravitate into a full-on shooting ceasefire.”
In contrast, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov warned on Sunday that progress on a deal was unlikely as it was “only the beginning” of what would be “difficult” negotiations.
Playing down concerns from Washington’s Nato allies that Mr Putin will merely use any ceasefire to rearm and launch further attacks on Ukraine and its neighbours, Mr Witkoff said: “I just don’t see that he wants to take all of Europe. This is a much different situation than it was in World War Two.”
In another blow to European allies, he criticised British prime minister Sir Keir Starmer’s plan for a “coalition of the willing” to provide military security guarantees for Kyiv under any peace deal as “a posture and a pose”.
Mr Witkoff criticised the plan – which is being rapidly hashed out by European leaders in response to the Trump administration’s dramatic withdrawal of support – as being based on a “simplistic” notion of thinking “we have all got to be like Winston Churchill”.
As the US-led talks got underway in Riyadh on Sunday, Washington officials told Bloomberg that Mr Trump was pushing for a peace deal in Ukraine by 20 April, a symbolic date on which both the Western and Orthodox churches will celebrate Easter this year.
Following a phone call last week, Mr Putin and Mr Trump agreed “that the movement to peace will begin” with a 30-day pause in attacks on Russian and Ukrainian energy facilities, the White House said.
But that narrowly defined ceasefire was quickly cast into doubt, with Kyiv accusing Moscow of bombing its own oil depot in Kursk to undermine the agreement, while also striking hospitals and homes in Ukraine and knocking out power to some railways.
Just hours before the talks in Saudi Arabia began, Ukrainian officials said Russia had killed seven people – including a five-year-old child – in overnight drone strikes on Kyiv, and four people in Donetsk.
