President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has approved the composition of the Ukrainian delegation to participate in negotiations with the United States and other international partners of Ukraine, as well as with representatives of Russia, to achieve a just and lasting peace. These meetings will begin today in the UAE.
The relevant decree has been published on the President’s website. The Ukrainian delegation has been approved as follows:
- Rustem Umerov — Secretary of the National Security and Defence Council of Ukraine, Head of the delegation
- Kyrylo Budanov — Head of the Office of the President of Ukraine
- Davyd Arakhamiya — Member of the Ukrainian Parliament
- Oleksandr Bevz — Adviser to the Cabinet of the President of Ukraine, Office of the President of Ukraine
- Andriy Hnatov — Chief of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine
- Oleh Ivashchenko — Head of the Main Intelligence Directorate of the Ministry of Defence of Ukraine
- Serhiy Kyslytsya — First Deputy Head of the Office of the President of Ukraine
- Yevhen Ostryanskyy — First Deputy Secretary of the National Security and Defence Council of Ukraine
- Oleksandr Poklad — First Deputy Head of the Security Service of Ukraine
- Vadym Skibitskyy — Deputy Head of the Main Intelligence Directorate of the Ministry of Defence of Ukraine.
Negotiations with the US and Russia
Yesterday, Ukraine and the US agreed on new meetings with Russian participation during a meeting of the presidents in Switzerland. The current negotiations are expected to last two days. Ukraine will inform Europe of the results of the meetings.
Before the start, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy will discuss by telephone with the negotiators the topics they will be authorised to address.
The Russian side will be represented by officials from the Ministry of Defence. The Kremlin has already stated that it continues to demand that Ukraine withdraw its troops from the entire Donbas region.
Territorial issues remain unresolved within the 20-point framework agreement that Ukraine is working on with the US and which the American side is coordinating with Russia.
Until last summer, trilateral talks were held in Turkey. The most recent ones took place in July 2025. The only result of those talks was several rounds of prisoner exchanges. The desired outcome — a trilateral meeting between the presidents of Ukraine, the US and Russia and an end to the war — was not achieved, and Russia did not back down from its demands.
Last year’s talks were the first contacts between Ukraine and Russia outside humanitarian issues since 2022. At that time, at the beginning of the full-scale invasion, representatives of the countries also met in Turkey. Before that, meetings were held in Belarus.