Ukraine’s Zelenskyy says next Russia talks likely in Abu Dhabi next month

Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said that the next round of United States-brokered negotiations with Russia would likely take place in Abu Dhabi in early March, after Ukrainian officials wrapped up a meeting with US envoys in Geneva.

Senior US and Ukrainian officials met at the city’s Hotel des Bergues on Thursday to discuss post-war reconstruction plans, amid a broader US push to end Russia’s war on Ukraine, now in its fifth year.

Following the meeting, Zelenskyy said in his regular nightly address that there was “already more readiness for the next trilateral format”.

Reiterating his desire for a meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin, Zelenskyy added that preparations needed to be made for “a meeting at the leadership level”. “This format can solve a lot,” he said.

Rustem Umerov, who led Ukraine’s four-person delegation in Geneva, said on Telegram that negotiators were working on finalising economic and security issues ‌to “make the next trilateral meeting involving the US ‌and ‌Russia as substantive as possible”.

“We worked out a document on the restoration of Ukraine in detail” with the Americans, said Umerov after the meeting with the US delegation, which included President Donald Trump’s envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner. The sides “agreed positions that will form the basis for further agreements”, he added.

Putin’s special envoy Kirill Dmitriev also held talks with US officials in Geneva on Thursday, but he declined to comment on the outcome of the meeting, according to the state-run RIA Novosti news agency.

Previous rounds of US-led negotiations between Kyiv and Moscow in Geneva and Abu Dhabi have failed to yield a breakthrough, including on the key sticking point of territory.

Umerov had said before Thursday’s meeting that work was continuing “within the framework of the negotiation process”, adding that those attending would work through “the prosperity package: mechanisms for economic support and recovery of Ukraine, instruments for attracting investment, and frameworks for long-term cooperation”.

He said the meeting would also involve preparations for the next round of trilateral negotiations with Russia, adding it was “necessary to synchronise positions ahead of this stage”.

The talks would also discuss the issue of possible prisoner exchanges, he said.

“We are focused on practical solutions,” he added.

Zelenskyy seeks Putin meeting

President Zelenskyy said on Wednesday he had spoken with Trump before the talks to discuss the issues that their representatives would cover in Geneva, “as well as preparations for the next meeting of the full negotiating teams in a trilateral format at the very beginning of March”.

Zelenskyy, who has repeatedly sought face-to-face meetings with his Russian counterpart Putin to resolve the most challenging issues, said he expected the meeting in Geneva would “create an opportunity to move talks to the leaders’ level”.

“President Trump supports this sequence of steps,” he said. “This is the only way to resolve all the complex and sensitive issues and finally end the war.”

Putin has dismissed such a meeting repeatedly in the past, calling into question Zelenskyy’s legitimacy as Ukraine’s leader.

Russia said Thursday it was too early to make forecasts about when any deal might take place.

“Have you heard anything from us about deadlines? We have no deadlines; we have tasks. We are getting them done,” Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov told state media.

In another development, ⁠Russia ⁠transferred the bodies ⁠of 1,000 dead ⁠Ukrainian soldiers in exchange for those of 35 ‌Russians, Kremlin aide Vladimir Medinsky said on Thursday. The two ⁠sides have periodically ⁠exchanged their war dead in the ⁠course of ⁠the ⁠war, but have not built on that to secure an elusive peace.

Russian attacks continue

The meeting in Geneva came hours after Russia pounded Ukraine with a barrage of 39 missiles and 420 drones across the country overnight, wounding at least 25 people, Ukrainian officials said.

At least 16 people were injured in attacks in the early hours of Thursday in the northeastern city of Kharkiv and the surrounding region, emergency services said, while in southeastern Zaporizhia, at least seven people were injured in attacks that damaged 19 apartment buildings, four homes and several other buildings.

Two people were also injured in the central city of Kryvyi Rih, officials said.

Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko said the latest attacks on the capital in the early hours of Thursday caused damage to a nine-storey residential building in the Darnytskyi district and fires in a home and garages elsewhere in the city.

The strikes on the capital prompted the activation of air defence systems to counter the attack, Tymur Tkachenko, head of the city’s military administration, said, advising residents to remain in shelters until the assault was over. No casualties were reported in the capital.

Ukraine has faced regular overnight barrages as Russia targeted cities with missiles and drones in harsh winter conditions in recent months, while also targeting civilian energy infrastructure, even amid an ongoing push by Washington to try to negotiate an end to Europe’s deadliest conflict since World War II.

Negotiations stalled

Despite Trump’s desire to bring an end to the conflict, one he claimed he could end in 24 hours after he retook office, the talks so far have failed to bear fruit.

Negotiations, based on a US plan unveiled late last year, have hit a roadblock over the thorniest territorial issues, such as control of the eastern Donbas, an industrial region in eastern Ukraine that has been at the heart of the fiercest fighting.

Russia is pushing for full control of Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region, in the Donbas, and has threatened to take it by force if Kyiv does not cave in at the negotiating table.

But Ukraine has rejected the demand and signalled it would not sign a deal without security guarantees that deter Russia from invading again. The Ukrainian constitution also forbids the ceding of territory.

Hundreds of thousands of people on both sides are believed to have been killed in Russia’s war in Ukraine.