Trump envoy to meet Ukraine officials in Saudi Arabia next week, seek initial ceasefire
Donald Trump’s special envoy has revealed plans for a meeting with Ukrainian officials to discuss a ceasefire with Russia - but Volodymyr Zelensky will not be there.
Donald Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff has revealed plans for a summit meeting next week with Ukrainian officials in Saudi Arabia, saying the parties would discuss a possible ceasefire with Russia.
“We’re now in discussions to coordinate a meeting with the Ukrainians… It will be [in] Saudi Arabia. And I think the idea is to get down a framework for a peace agreement and an initial ceasefire as well,” Mr Witkoff told reporters on the White House driveway.
The meeting will attempt to restore US-Ukrainian dialogue after the Trump administration moved to halt the flow of weapons and intelligence to Kyiv in response to an explosive Oval Office meeting last week featuring Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.
The Ukrainian leader was not expected to attend the Saudi Arabia meeting, but he has now said he will visit Saudi Arabia next Monday, a day before planned talks there.
Mr Zelensky said his trip was to meet Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.
“After that, my team will stay in Saudi Arabia to work with our American partners. Ukraine is most interested in peace,” he said in a post on social media.
Mr Zelensky said that he opposes a temporary ceasefire, citing Russian President Vladimir Putin’s prior deal-breaking.
“We can’t just speak about ceasefire and speak and speak. It will not work,” Mr Zelensky said at that meeting, fueling Mr Trump’s rage.
Mr Trump told him: “Look, if you could get a ceasefire right now, I tell you you’d take it, so the bullets stop flying and your men stop getting killed.”
The clash erupted over Mr Zelensky’s demand for further US security guarantees, which Mr Trump argued he had already effectively granted via a framework pact to give America a stake in the country’s rare earth elements.
Mr Zelensky has expressed regret for the tumultuous meeting and a willingness to sign the mining agreement, though Mr Trump has accused him of being disrespectful and said his counterpart “won’t be around very long” if he won’t make a peace deal.
Mr Trump’s envoy to Russia and Ukraine, Keith Kellogg, said he was aware of no US talks with Ukrainian opposition figures about potentially toppling Mr Zelensky, saying he “would find it really hard to believe right now,” denying a Politico report about recent alleged contacts.
Mr Kellogg also said that Ukrainians forced the US’s hand in cutting off arms and “brought it on themselves.”
Meanwhile, Mr Zelensky repeatedly thanked European leaders for their ongoing support in the war against Russia ahead of an emergency summit in Brussels.
Speaking alongside European Council president Antonio Costa and European Commission president Ursula van der Leyen on Thursday local time (Friday AEDT), Mr Zelensky repeatedly praised leaders for their support and came after he was criticised by Donald Trump and JD Vance for being ungrateful for their assistance in the war.
“I want to thank all our European leaders, first of all, for signalling such strong support,” he said before the summit.
“This constant strong support from the very beginning of the war and what’s been during all this period and last week, you stay with us.
“From all the Ukrainians, from all our nations, big appreciation, we are very thankful that we are not alone.
“These are not just words, we feel it”.
The emergency summit with European leaders comes after President Trump upended his alliances with Europe despite being reported as “reconsidering” the suspension of military aid to Ukraine.
During last week’s disastrous meeting at the Oval Office, a visibly frustrated Mr Vance said to the Ukrainian president, “Have you said ‘thank you’ once this entire meeting?”
Mr Trump also added that he was not “being thankful”.
On Thursday local time, 27 European leaders will attend the meeting and also NATO secretary-general Mark Rutte.
On Thursday Mr Zelensky also said the European leaders had made a “strong signal to Ukrainian people, to Ukrainian warriors, to civilians, to our families and it’s great that we are not alone”.
“Thank you so much for everything”.
EU chiefs have been seen to be walking around with Mr Zelensky
Mr Costa said the summit would aim to “take decisions and to deliver” and he hoped “concrete decisions” would be made about increasing spending capacity.
“Of course the security and spending of Europe is not separated from Ukraine security and defence,” he said.
Europe faces a clear and present danger.
— Ursula von der Leyen (@vonderleyen) March 6, 2025
We must be able to defend ourselves and put Ukraine in a position of strength.
ReArmEurope will boost defence spending, strengthen our defence industrial base and push the private sector to invest ↓ https://t.co/hSQwJ9txzh
“Stronger European defences, it boosts Ukrainian defence and the stronger capacity for Ukraine defence is also very important to boost our own defence”.
Ms van der Leyen said earlier it was a “watershed moment for Europe” ahead of discussing a €650 billion boost to defence spending.
She also posted on X shortly before the summit that, “Europe faces a clear and present danger”.
“We must be able to defend ourselves and put Ukraine in a position of strength,” Ms van der Leyen posted.
“ReArmEurope will boost defence spending, strengthen our defence industrial base and push the private sector to invest”.
TRUMP TO REVOKE LEGAL STATUS FOR 240K UKRAINIANS
US President Donald Trump’s administration is planning to revoke temporary legal status for approximately 240,000 Ukrainians who fled the conflict with Russia, a senior Trump official and three sources familiar with the matter told Associated Press.
The Ukrainian refugees will potentially be caught up in President Trump’s widening deportation net, with the mass expulsions expected as soon as April.
It will be a shocking about-face from the welcome Ukrainians received under President Joe Biden’s Democratic administration.
Meanwhile, Germany’s defence minister said that Berlin would try to offset some of the damage to Ukraine from the US suspension of aid and intelligence sharing as the country fights off Russia’s invasion.
“We are of course trying to compensate for the loss of US support to a great extent with new measures,” Boris Pistorius told a Berlin press conference alongside his Ukrainian counterpart Rustem Umerov.
The American decision to freeze help to Ukraine came after a White House meeting last week in which Mr Trump berated Mr Zelensky for insufficient gratitude and told him that Ukraine had to “make a deal (with Russia) or we’re out”.
Germany has been Ukraine’s second biggest source of aid after the United States and has taken in more than a million Ukrainian refugees.
RUSSIA CALLS MACRON NUCLEAR COMMENTS A ‘THREAT’
Meanwhile, Moscow viewed comments by French President Emmanuel Macron about extending France’s nuclear deterrent to European partners as a “threat”, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Thursday local time.
“Of course it is a threat against Russia. If he sees us as a threat … and says that it is necessary to use a nuclear weapon, is preparing to use a nuclear weapon against Russia, of course it is a threat,” Mr Lavrov said at a press conference.
Mr Macron in an address to the nation called Russia a “threat to France and Europe” and said the French were “legitimately worried” about the United States shifting its position on the Ukraine conflict under US President Donald Trump.
He said he would open a debate on extending France’s nuclear deterrent to other European nations, following a phone conversation with Germany’s likely next chancellor Friedrich Merz on extending that umbrella of protection.
Russian foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said Mr Macron was “detached from reality” and making “contradictory statements”.
She mockingly compared him to a character in a Hans Christian Andersen fairy tale, Ole Lukoje, who holds umbrellas over sleeping children.
The French president also reaffirmed that European military forces could be sent to Ukraine if a peace accord was signed to guarantee “respect” of a deal.
Mr Lavrov, though, said Russia was unwavering in its opposition to the deployment of European forces in Ukraine as peacekeepers, suggesting they would not be impartial.
“We see no room for compromise. This discussion is being held with an overtly hostile aim,” he added.
Russia will consider such troops in the same way as it would view NATO presence in Ukraine, Mr Lavrov said.
He compared Mr Macron to Hitler and Napoleon, saying that unlike those leaders, Mr Macron did not openly say he wanted to conquer Russia, but he “evidently wants the same thing”.
Mr Macron is making “stupid accusations against Russia” that President Vladimir Putin has repeatedly dismissed as “madness and nonsense”, he added.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov called Mr Macron’s speech “extremely confrontational”, saying Russia felt that “France wants the war to continue.” Mr Macron is saying that “Russia has become practically an enemy of France” but not that NATO’s military presence is encroaching Russia’s borders, he said.
– with AFP
More Coverage
Originally published as Trump envoy to meet Ukraine officials in Saudi Arabia next week, seek initial ceasefire