Trump envoy dishes on exactly what happened during his closed-door five-hour meeting with Putin

By CHARLIE SPIERING, SENIOR POLITICAL REPORTER, WASHINGTON, DC

Published: 15:54 BST, 15 April 2025 | Updated: 18:49 BST, 15 April 2025

United States special envoy Steve Witkoff revealed Monday there was real progress during his latest meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin regarding peace talks and a reset of relations between the two countries.

Witkoff said that he met with Russian president Vladimir Putin and his military advisors Yuri Ushakov and Kirill Dmitriev for ongoing peace talks between Russia and Ukraine.

‘It was a compelling meeting,’ Witkoff said. ‘And toward the end, we actually came up with – I’m going to say ‘finally,’ but I don’t mean it in the way that we were waiting, I mean it in the way that it took a while for us to get to this place,’ he told Fox News host Sean Hannity in an interview on Monday evening. 

‘What Putin’s request is to get, to have a permanent peace here,’ he added. 

Witkoff said he also discussed security protocols, NATO, and Article V, with Putin as well as economic opportunities.

I believe there’s a possibility to reshape the Russian-United States relationship through some very compelling commercial opportunities that I think give real stability to the region too,’ he said.

This is the third meeting Witkoff has had in Moscow with the Russians, as President Trump is growing impatient about the lack of movement in negotiations with Russia.

‘Russia has to get moving,’ Trump wrote on social media on Friday. ‘Too many people are DYING, thousands a week, in a terrible and senseless war – A war that should have never happened, and wouldn’t have happened, if I were President!!!’

Russia’s President Vladimir Putin shakes hands with US President Donald Trump’s envoy Steve Witkoff during a meeting in Saint Petersburg

Russia’s top economic negotiator Kirill Dmitriev talks to US President Donald Trump’s envoy Steve Witkoff in Saint Petersburg

Witkoff has angered some Democrats for his positive comments about Putin as he continues to negotiate with Russia.

 ‘I don’t regard Putin as a bad guy. That is a complicated situation, that war, and all the ingredients that led up to it,’ Witkoff said during an interview with the Trucker Carlson Show in March, adding that he ‘liked’ the Russian president.

Witkoff has also defended President Trump’s efforts to negotiated a peace with Russia and Ukraine.

‘I sit with the president and we talk often about what the end game is, where does he want to get to, and once you decide where to get to then it’s all about tactically figuring out what that pathway is,’ he said.

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Trump envoy dishes on exactly what happened during his closed-door five-hour meeting with Putin

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