Bloomberg has published an exclusive transcript of a conversation about how an aide to US President Donald Trump Steve Witkoff gives the Kremlin advice on how best to appease the US leader. The materials shed light on Witkoff's"questionable loyalty" and Moscow's possible influence on American efforts to negotiate an end to the war.

This is stated in the analysis of the British resource The Guardian . But no less interesting is the very fact of the leak of such a conversation and the possible source of the"leak". The publication recalls that Bloomberg wrote about two phone calls: between Vitkoff and a high-ranking Kremlin aide, Yuri Ushakov, and between Ushakov and Kirill Dmitriev, who participated in negotiations with the White House.

The author noted that the high-profile article was published without a signature or even a date. This was probably done because indicating the place of writing or the name of the author could provide clues as to the identity of the source.

"Ushakov, who participated in both phone conversations, appeared to confirm the authenticity of the recordings on Wednesday: while he claimed some of them were"forgeries," he said he would not comment on the rest because the conversations were confidential, and added that leaking information about such discussions was"naturally unacceptable," the British resource notes.

The content of the leaked conversations confirms suspicions of Witkoff's closeness to the Russian position in the negotiations. However, the question of who exactly provided such sensitive recordings to the agency is more complicated, the author of the analysis adds.

"It's very difficult to speculate. It could be 100 million different things, including someone on the Russian side trying to damage Witkoff's reputation," explained Daniel Hoffman, the former head of the CIA's Moscow office.

Who could have leaked Witkoff's conversation with the Russians?

Russian intelligence services, in particular, have a history of intercepting and publishing confidential conversations. However, Moscow has no motive to compromise Ushakov, although given the disagreements within the Russian elite, this cannot be ruled out either, the article says.

Ukraine could also have had a motive for making the call public, the author believes:

"Kyiv is very unhappy with Witkoff's role in the negotiations and would like to undermine his position, as well as to make public the shocking extent of cooperation between the Kremlin and the White House adviser. But the risk of a catastrophic break in relations with the Americans if exposed will likely make Ukrainian officials think twice, and it will also be an impressive technical achievement for Ukrainian intelligence services, who were able to listen to a WhatsApp call that took place outside Ukrainian territory," the material says.

A former senior intelligence official noted that the call could have been intercepted by any number of intelligence agencies. However, the most likely source of the leak was someone within the US system:

"There are various ways to intercept calls, including traditional electronic intelligence methods, cyberattacks and access to devices, so theoretically anything is possible, but I strongly suspect that this happened on the US side, and if so, there are two organizations that are capable of doing it - the CIA and the NSA."

Although many in the US intelligence community are dissatisfied with the Trump administration and its policies towards Ukraine and Russia,"leaking" such information would be an extremely dangerous step for any disgruntled employee.

Furthermore, the fact that Bloomberg obtained not only a transcript of the conversation but also an audio recording suggests that the source was either directly involved in the intelligence gathering or was high-ranking enough to have access to the original audio recording.

Another former intelligence officer believes that European intelligence, outraged by the pro-Russian position of Trump's special envoy, may be behind the high-profile leak.

"Leak" of Witkoff's conversation with a Russian representative: Trump's reaction

After the publication of the scandalous conversation between Witkoff and Ushakov, the US President Donald Trump stated that he does not see anything wrong with this conversation. According to the American leader, this is a"standard form of negotiations."

"This is a standard thing, you know? He needs to sell it to Ukraine. He needs to 'sell' Ukraine to Russia. This is what a negotiator does," he said.