Zelenskyy signals a possible meeting before the New Year.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on Friday that he will meet U.S. President Donald Trump in the near future.
“Rustem Umerov [head of Ukraine’s National Security and Defense Council] reported on his latest contacts with the American side. We are not losing a single day. We have agreed on a meeting at the highest level — with President Trump in the near future. A lot can be decided before the New Year. Glory to Ukraine!” Zelenskyy wrote in a post on X.
Zelenskyy’s announcement came after Thursday talks with U.S. lead negotiator Steve Witkoff and Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner, which the Ukrainian president called a “good conversation” and said yielded “timing on how to bring a real peace closer.”
Contacts between Ukrainian and U.S. officials have intensified as prospects for a possible peace deal grow in the war-torn country, which has been resisting Russian aggression for nearly four years.
Umerov, who is leading Kyiv’s delegation, met Witkoff and Kushner last week in Miami. That followed a recent trip to Berlin by the American pair to meet with Ukrainian and European officials.
The updated 20-point draft peace plan that Zelenskyy unveiled on Wednesday includes the possibility of creating a special economic zone in some areas of Donbas, the eastern territories claimed by Moscow.
The Ukrainian leader said the latest version of the plan — an update of a Trump administration proposal that both Kyiv and the European Union had initially dismissed as a “non-starter” — maintains the proposed security guarantees from the U.S., NATO and European partners that are equivalent to those outlined in Article 5 of the transatlantic alliance’s treaty.
Moscow said it had been analyzing the proposal.