Russia is prepared to resume trilateral negotiations with Ukraine and the US after Nov. 4, following Russia’s National Unity Day holiday, Kremlin foreign policy aide Yuri Ushakov announced on Sunday, Oct. 25.
Speaking to Russian state media, the senior Kremlin adviser confirmed Moscow’s willingness to re-engage in working-level consultations, while refraining from setting a definitive calendar date for the next diplomatic round.
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“Right now the next deadline is Nov. 4, our major holiday,” Ushakov said in an official dispatch reported by news agencies. “After that, we will be ready to resume negotiations.”
Ushakov tempered expectations regarding immediate breakthroughs, characterizing the prospective tripartite session as an exploratory, range-finding engagement designed to test positions rather than conclude definitive agreements.
Substantial diplomatic work remains necessary before any comprehensive settlement framework can materialize, the aide added.
Working-level sequencing and diplomatic tracks
The timeline outlined by the Kremlin places prospective trilateral consultations in early November, coinciding with preparations for broader international summitry.
Earlier on Sunday, Ushakov confirmed that Moscow, Beijing, and Washington have agreed in principle to convene a three-way summit between Russian President Vladimir Putin, US President Donald Trump, and Chinese President Xi Jinping on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) leaders’ summit scheduled for Nov. 18-19 in Shenzhen, China.
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Ushakov indicated that operational progress achieved during working-level consultations and the Shenzhen summit would directly dictate whether Vladimir Putin attends the Group of 20 (G20) summit in Miami, Florida, scheduled for December.
The post-Nov. 4 timeframe also follows high-level shuttle diplomacy conducted by White House special envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, who met with Putin in Saint Petersburg on Oct. 21 after holding consultations with Ukrainian and European leadership in Oslo on Oct. 20.
Previous diplomatic reporting indicated that working delegations from Kyiv, Washington, and Moscow could convene in Abu Dhabi or Switzerland to lay the groundwork for high-level meetings.
European security concerns
While Moscow has signaled conditional openness to resume tripartite talks, fundamental divides persist regarding the baseline principles of any settlement.
President Volodymyr Zelensky affirmed in recent remarks that Kyiv is prepared to freeze combat operations along the existing line of contact to bring an immediate halt to active hostilities, but firmly ruled out the formal surrender of sovereign territory or legal recognition of occupied regions as Russian land.
Zelensky has demanded binding security guarantees, minimum ten-year international defense funding, and an enforceable ceasefire as prerequisites for any enduring peace.
At the same time, European capitals have raised alarms over great-power diplomacy brokered without direct continental participation.
Former Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk and European leaders have cautioned that tripartite arrangements excluding affected partners risk partitioning European security structures, while the EU continues to explore mechanisms – including the potential appointment of a dedicated European peace envoy – to ensure continental interests are defended at the negotiating table.
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