U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio meets with Ukraine's Secretary of the Security and Defense Council Rustem Umerov and other members of a Ukrainian delegation in Hallandale Beach, Florida. REUTERS/Eva Marie UzcateguiSenior U.S. officials and a Ukrainian delegation began a meeting in Florida on Sunday to discuss Washington's plan to end the war with Russia, in a meeting that seeks to lay the groundwork for key talks scheduled for this week in Moscow with Russian leader Vladimir Putin.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio, special envoy Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, President Donald Trump's son-in-law, began the meeting at around 10:10 a.m. local time with Ukrainian negotiators led by Rustem Umerov, head of Ukraine's Security Council, according to an AFP journalist.
Rubio declared that the talks seek to guarantee not only an end to the killing, but also “an end to the war, leaving Ukraine sovereign and independent and with a chance for true prosperity.”
The Ukrainian delegation also includes Andrii Hnatov, head of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, and Andrii Sybiha, the country's foreign minister, President Volodymyr Zelensky announced.
Ukrainian Security and Defense Council Secretary Rustem Umerov participates in a meeting with Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Special Envoy Steve Witkoff, and Jared Kushner in Hallandale Beach, Florida. REUTERS/Eva Marie UzcateguiThe negotiations come at a delicate time for Ukraine, which continues to face the Russian forces that invaded the country in 2022. On Friday, Zelensky announced the resignation of his powerful chief of staff, Andrii Yermak, who until then had been the country's main negotiator in talks with the United States.
The announcement came after Yermak's home was searched by anti-corruption investigators. Zelensky's government has been rocked by a $100 million scandal involving the embezzlement of funds from the energy sector through bribes paid by contractors, which has generated renewed internal pressure on the Ukrainian president.
Just a week ago, Rubio had met with Yermak in Geneva, and both sides described the talks as positive for developing a revised peace plan.
Developed through negotiations between Washington and Moscow, this plan was criticized for being too biased toward Russian demands. It initially envisioned Ukraine ceding the entire eastern Donbas region to Russia, a point of contention for Kyiv.
The plan, which Trump has subsequently downplayed as a “concept” or a “map” to be “fine-tuned,” would have imposed limits on the size of the Ukrainian military, blocked the country’s entry into NATO, and required Ukraine to hold elections within 100 days. Negotiators have indicated that the framework has changed, but it is unclear how its provisions have been altered.
Trump said Tuesday he would send Witkoff and possibly Kushner to Moscow this week to meet with Putin about the plan. Both Witkoff and Kushner, like Trump, come from the real estate world, which values negotiation over diplomatic conventions. The pair were also behind a 20-point proposal that led to a ceasefire in Gaza.
Zelensky wrote in X that the Ukrainian delegation would work “quickly and substantively on the steps needed to end the war.”
In his late-night address on Saturday, Zelensky said the U.S. side is “demonstrating a constructive approach.” “In the coming days, it is feasible to develop the steps to determine how to bring the war to a dignified end,” he stated.
The attacks continue despite diplomatic efforts. On Saturday, Russian drone and missile strikes in and around Kyiv killed at least three people and wounded dozens more. Further attacks in the early hours of Sunday left one person dead and 19 wounded, including four children, when a drone struck a nine-story apartment building in the city of Vyshhorod, in the Kyiv region.
