US President Donald Trump’s special envoy met with Russian President Vladimir Putin yesterday in Moscow as Washington intensifies its push for a deal to end the war in Ukraine.
The Kremlin published a short video on Telegram of Steve Witkoff greeting the Russian leader before sitting down at a table with him. Putin’s foreign policy aide Yuri Ushakov and envoy for economic relations Kirill Dmitriev were also present.
Witkoff was set to raise with Putin a US demand that Ukraine have the right to develop its own army and defense industry as part of any peace agreement.
Photo: EPA-EFE
Trump, who is rushing to end the war as he approaches the first 100 days of his presidency, on Wednesday ramped up pressure on Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy to accept a peace deal that critics fear will favor Moscow. Witkoff’s meeting with Putin is his fourth as the US works to achieve a ceasefire.
Agreeing to let Kyiv maintain its armed forces, as demanded by Ukraine and its European allies, would mean Putin would have to give up on his demand for the “demilitarization” of the country, one of his main stated aims in the war that is now in its fourth year.
Other US proposals for a deal have tilted far more in Moscow’s favor, including Washington’s recognition of Russia’s 2014 occupation of Crimea and freezing the war largely along existing battle lines that would leave Putin in control of swaths of eastern and southern Ukraine. Kyiv would also be required to abandon its goal of joining NATO.
The international community has resisted recognizing the Crimean peninsula as Russian to avoid legitimizing Putin’s illegal annexation. Zelenskiy has repeatedly said he would not cede territory to Moscow.
Asked if he would accept a deal in which Crimea and other regions Putin has taken from Ukraine were folded into Russia, Trump in an interview with Time magazine published yesterday said: “Crimea will stay with Russia.”
He added that Zelenskiy “understands that.”
The US leader on Thursday said that he is putting “a lot of pressure on both” sides in the war.
He said he thought Putin “wants to make a deal. We’re going to find out very soon.”
Asked what concessions Russia has offered, Trump said: “Stopping the war, stopping taking the whole country — pretty big concession.”
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov in an interview with CBS News said there were “several signs that we are moving in the right direction” toward a deal, while adding that Moscow still saw issues that needed to be negotiated.
Russia has continued to bomb Ukrainian cities even as talks have continued. It carried out the biggest airstrike of the year against Ukraine earlier this week, targeting Kyiv and killing at least 12 people. Trump criticized Putin for the latest round of attacks on Ukraine, while Zelenskiy has called for an “unconditional ceasefire” to facilitate talks.
Also yesterday, Russian Major General Yaroslav Moskalik, the deputy head of the main operations directorate for Russia’s General Staff, was killed by an explosive device placed in his car in Balashikha, just outside Moscow, the country’s investigative committee said.
Japan has deployed long-range missiles in a southwestern region near China, the Japanese defense minister said yesterday, at a time when ties with Beijing are at their lowest in recent years. The missiles were installed in Kumamoto in the southern region of Kyushu, as Japan is attempting to shore up its military capacity as China steps up naval activity in the East China Sea. “Standoff defense capabilities enable us to counter the threat of enemy forces attempting to invade our country ... while ensuring the safety of our personnel,” Japanese Minister of Defense Shinjiro Koizumi said. “This is an extremely important initiative for
The nation’s fastest supercomputer, Nano 4 (晶創26), is scheduled to be launched in the third quarter, and would be used to train large language models in finance and national defense sectors, the National Center for High-Performance Computing (NCHC) said. The supercomputer, which would operate at about 86.05 petaflops, is being tested at a new cloud computing center in the Southern Taiwan Science Park in Tainan. The exterior of the server cabinet features chip circuitry patterns overlaid with a map of Taiwan, highlighting the nation’s central position in the semiconductor industry. The center also houses Taiwania 2, Taiwania 3, Forerunner 1 and
MORE POPULAR: Taiwan Pass sales increased by 59 percent during the first quarter compared with the same period last year, the Tourism Administration said The Tourism Administration yesterday said that it has streamlined the Taiwan Pass, with two versions available for purchase beginning today. The tourism agency has made the pass available to international tourists since 2024, allowing them to access the high-speed rail, Taiwan Railway Corp services, four MRT systems and four Taiwan Tourist Shuttles. Previously, five types of Taiwan Pass were available, but some tourists have said that the offerings were too complicated. The agency said only two types of Taiwan Pass would be available, starting from a three-day pass with the high-speed rail and a three-day pass with Taiwan Railway Corp. The former costs NT$2,800
FIRST TRIAL: Ko’s lawyers sought reduced bail and other concessions, as did other defendants, but the bail judge denied their requests, citing the severity of the sentences Former Taipei mayor Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) was yesterday sentenced to 17 years in prison and had his civil rights suspended for six years over corruption, embezzlement and other charges. Taipei prosecutors in December last year asked the Taipei District Court for a combined 28-year, six-month sentence for the four cases against Ko, who founded the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP). The cases were linked to the Core Pacific City (京華城購物中心) redevelopment project and the mismanagement of political donations. Other defendants convicted on separate charges included Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Taipei City Councilor Angela Ying (應曉薇), who was handed a 15-year, six-month sentence; Core Pacific
RSS