MIAMI: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Saturday that Washington had proposed the first face-to-face negotiations between Ukraine and Russia in half a year, as diplomats converged on Miami for fresh talks on ending the war.

Russian envoy Kirill Dmitriev said he was heading to Miami, while Ukrainian and European teams were also in the sunny American city for the negotiations, mediated by Donald Trump’s envoy Steve Witkoff and the US president’s son-in-law Jared Kushner.

“They proposed this format as far as I understand: Ukraine, America, Russia,” Zelensky said, adding that the Europeans could be present and it would be “logical to hold such a joint meeting… after we understand the potential results of the meeting that has already taken place”.

Trump’s envoys have pushed a plan in which the United States would offer security guarantees to Ukraine, but Kyiv will likely be expected to surrender some territory, a prospect resented by many Ukrainians.

However, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Friday promised not to force Ukraine into any agreement, saying “there’s no peace deal unless Ukraine agrees to it”. He added that he may join the talks on Saturday in Miami, his hometown.

Rubio says ‘there’s no peace deal unless Kyiv agrees to it’

Dmitriev wrote in an X post that he was “on the way to Miami”, adding a peace dove emoji and attaching a short video of a morning sun shining through clouds on a beach with palms.

“As warmongers keep working overtime to undermine the US peace plan for Ukraine, I remembered this video from my previous visit — light breaking through the storm clouds,” he added.

The last time Ukrainian and Russian envoys held official direct talks was in July in Istanbul, which led to prisoner swaps but little else in the way of concrete progress.

Russian and European involvement marks a step forward from before, when the Americans held separate negotiations with each side in different locations. However, it is unlikely Dmitriev would hold direct talks with European negotiators as relations between the two sides remain extremely strained.

Moscow, which sent troops into Ukraine in February 2022, argues that Europe’s involvement in the talks would only hinder the process and tends to paint the continent’s leaders as pro-war.

Russia presses on

The weekend talks come after President Vladimir Putin vowed to press ahead with his military offensive in Ukraine, hailing Moscow’s battlefield gains nearly four years into his war in an annual news conference on Friday.

Russia announced on Saturday it had captured two villages in Ukraine’s Sumy and Donetsk regions, further grinding through the country’s east in costly battles. Putin however suggested that Russia could pause its devastating strikes on the country to allow Ukraine to hold a presidential ballot — a prospect which his Ukrainian counterpart rejected.

“It is not Putin who decides when and in what format the elections in Ukraine will take place,” said Zelensky, who also ruled out votes in territories occupied by Russia.

Published in Dawn, December 21st, 2025