Russia announces trilateral peace talks with US and Ukraine to be held in November

 Russia has agreed to trilateral peace talks with the US and Ukraine. 

The meeting will be held in the United Arab Emirates next month, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov confirmed on Friday. 

Russia's readiness to resume the talks, which have been at a standstill since the beginning of the year, follows a meeting this week in Saint Petersburg between President Vladimir Putin and US special envoy Steve Witkoff.

The announcement came amid intensified diplomatic efforts by US President Donald Trump's administration, with Witkoff first meeting on Tuesday with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and European leaders in Oslo, before meeting with Putin on Wednesday.

Following the meetings, both Kyiv and Moscow voiced their willingness to resume direct talks mediated by Washington.

Russia, which launched its full-scale offensive against Ukraine in February 2022, has suggested talks could take place 'around November 10', while Zelensky has called for the discussions to happen 'as soon as possible'.

In a televised interview aired late Thursday, Putin meanwhile said that any trilateral talks would focus on the security arrangements of a final peace deal and not a 'short' truce.

It comes as the US' relationship with Russia appears to be growing. 

During his visit to Saint Petersburg, Witkoff hailed Putin as a 'humanitarian' after the Russian leader announced that Moscow had freed Steven Hubbard, a 74-year-old retired American teacher who had been behind bars in Russia since 2022. 

‘You talk so much about my president, President Trump, being a humanitarian. You are a humanitarian also, sir,’ Witkoff told Putin as the two men sat across from each other at the Konstantinovsky Palace on Wednesday. 

The exchange sparked backlash, with commentators condemning Witkoff. 

Washington Post columnist Max Boot called the moment ‘nauseating and embarrassing’, while The Atlantic’s Anne Applebaum asked how 'humanitarian' could apply to a leader whose forces kill civilians and abduct children, and have his permission to torture and rape.

The praise lands at an awkward moment for the White House. Its warming relationship with Moscow is drawing growing criticism as Trump leans on Kyiv to accept a negotiated settlement and pursues closer economic ties with Russia.

Trump has insisted that Hubbard was released without the US giving anything in return. 

Witkoff also used the meeting to thank Putin for lifting export controls on Russian diesel. Russia announced the move as the envoy arrived, under a deal with Trump that will soon see shipments head to the US.

Thanking the Russian president, Witkoff said: 'I want to thank you for your decision to remove export controls on diesel oil from Russia and to sell not just to the United States but also to the world at large.

'I know the President is deeply grateful for it, as are our farmers and other truckers who use diesel and have been adversely affected by this diesel crisis, and people all over the world. So it's an example of us all working together, and I want to say thank you to you for that.'

Witkoff added that he had brought 'ideas' for a possible peace deal with Ukraine, telling Putin: 'We've brought some papers. It's really some ideas, some sort of peace deal between Russia and Ukraine, and you'll read that at your leisure.'

The longtime Russian leader has previously refused to hold face-to-face talks with Zelensky and said that Moscow intends to seize the rest of eastern Ukraine.