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By Shane Croucher
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The Kremlin again warned that its war in Ukraine would continue until Russia's goals were met, and that there could be no long-term peace without resolving the territorial issues at the heart of negotiations, after the latest talks in Moscow between Russian President Vladimir Putin and U.S. envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner.
Witkoff and Kushner headed straight from Moscow to Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, where a fresh set of trilateral negotiations between the U.S., Russia and Ukraine is scheduled to take place on Friday. On Thursday, Witkoff expressed optimism about the prospect of reaching a peace deal soon, saying the negotiations were down to a single issue that he described as solvable.
U.S. President Donald Trump, a self-styled global peacemaker, has made ending Russia's war in Ukraine a priority for his administration, having initially said he could bring about peace on "Day One" of his second term. But the war continues at a human cost of tens of thousands of lives every month. February will see the fourth anniversary of Russia's full-scale invasion.
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"The talks lasted about four hours and were exceptionally substantive and constructive and, I would say, extremely—extremely—frank and conducted in a spirit of trust," said top Putin adviser Yuri Ushakov, who gave an update to journalists in Moscow, state news agency RIA reported.
Ushakov also said, originally in Russian: "As Vladimir Putin has emphasized, we are sincerely interested in resolving the Ukrainian crisis through political and diplomatic means. But until that happens, Russia will continue to consistently pursue the objectives set for the special military operation."
He said the "main point is that during these talks between our president and the Americans, it was once again stated that without resolving the territorial issue according to the formula agreed in Anchorage, one should not expect to achieve a long-term settlement.”
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Russia is demanding that Ukraine hand over the remainder of its industrial Donbas region, comprising the Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts, not already under the control of the Kremlin's forces. Ukraine still holds two fortress cities in Donetsk—Kramatorsk and Sloviansk—that analysts say could take years for Russia to conquer.
Ukraine says it is constitutionally bound to hold a referendum on ceding territory, but it cannot lawfully conduct a vote while the country is under martial law due to the war.
Kyiv also objects to rewarding Russia for its aggression, a position supported by its European allies, who are concerned about the broader implications for security on the Continent if the Kremlin has designs on other former Soviet states, such as those in the Baltic.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Friday that the Donbas issue would be discussed in Abu Dhabi, according to Ukrinform, a state news agency in Kyiv.
Dmitry Peskov, Putin's spokesman, declined to elaborate on the Anchorage formula referred to by Ushakov. He said the Kremlin does not want to “go into details publicly” about it, state news agency TASS reported, adding: “We consider this to be inadvisable."
Zelensky held a "productive and substantive" meeting with Trump at the annual World Economic Forum gathering in Davos on Thursday. "Russians have to be ready for compromises because, you know, everybody has to be ready, not only Ukraine," Zelensky said, "and this is important for us."
On Wednesday, Trump said Zelensky and Putin would be stupid not to agree on a peace deal.
"I believe they're at a point now where they can come together and get a deal done. And if they don't, they're stupid," Trump said. "That goes for both of them. And I know they're not stupid. But if they don't get this done, they are stupid. … You got to get this deal done. Too many people are dying. It's not worth it."
Updated, 1/23/26, 5 a.m. ET: This article was updated with more comments by Zelensky and Peskov.
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