Russia and Ukraine Open First US-Brokered Peace Talks in Nine Months in Abu Dhabi
Negotiators from Russia, Ukraine and the United States opened two days of US-brokered peace talks in Abu Dhabi on Tuesday, November 10, their first three-way meeting since February, as Washington pushes for a broad deal to end a war now in its fifth year.
The talks, scheduled for Tuesday and Wednesday, bring the warring sides back to the table after a nine-month gap. The last round, held in Geneva on February 18, ended without a breakthrough, and Washington’s attention then turned to the war with Iran.
President Donald Trump has said he sees a “very strong inclination” to end the war in Ukraine and believes both sides are “tired of fighting.” US officials, however, have cautioned that the Abu Dhabi round is a working-level meeting, not a leaders’ summit, and that no ceasefire or peace agreement has been agreed.
Who is at the table
The American delegation is led by special envoy Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, the president’s son-in-law and a senior negotiator on the file. The two have spent weeks preparing for the meetings and, according to US officials, held daily phone calls — sometimes several a day — with Russian and Ukrainian officials over the past two weeks.
Russia’s delegation is headed by Kremlin aide Vladimir Medinsky, who has led Moscow’s side in previous rounds. Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov is taking part for the first time, along with senior military officer Yuri Zhigarlovsky.
Ukraine’s team is led by Rustem Umerov, the head of the country’s National Security and Defence Council and its foreign intelligence chief.
Officials from Britain, France, Germany, Italy, NATO and the European Union are also in Abu Dhabi, but for separate meetings. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said the negotiations themselves would remain trilateral, with the United States mediating between Russia and Ukraine. Ukrainian delegates are expected to brief their European allies separately on the progress of the discussions.
What is on the agenda
The talks are expected to cover postwar security arrangements for Ukraine, de-escalation steps, humanitarian measures and further steps toward ending the fighting. A military working group, led by US European Command chief Gen. Alexus Grynkewich, is expected to work on ceasefire monitoring and security arrangements, according to Axios.
The central question remains territory. In public, neither side has moved. Russia demands that Ukraine give up the parts of the Donetsk region it still holds, while Kyiv wants to freeze the front line where it stands.
Behind closed doors, the picture may be less rigid. A US official briefing reporters on the eve of the talks said Moscow and Kyiv had shown “a little bit of flexibility, privately” over who would control Ukraine’s eastern regions after the war. The official said the territorial question would not be settled until both sides knew what postwar security arrangements would look like.
US negotiators believe Presidents Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Vladimir Putin may each be willing to compromise on territory, “each ceding a little,” a US official told Reuters. Under the proposed deal, Ukraine would get an end to the war, security guarantees and a roadmap to accession to the European Union. A senior Ukrainian official strongly denied the government would consider any such concessions.
US officials said they had discussed with Russia security guarantees for Ukraine similar to Article 5 of NATO’s founding treaty, under which an attack on one member is treated as an attack on all. They also raised reviving the NATO-Russia Council, largely dormant since 2022, and said sanctions on Russia could be lifted as part of a deal.
Kushner, writing on X ahead of the talks, tempered expectations. He said the meetings could at most “build momentum toward the next phase of negotiations” and that a lasting settlement would require direct talks between Russia and Europe on the arrangements that affect them.
Why this matters
The Abu Dhabi round is the first serious test in months of whether diplomacy can narrow the gap between Moscow and Kyiv. It comes as the war grinds toward its fifth anniversary, with Russian front-line advances slowed to a virtual halt this year and Ukraine retaking some territory in Donetsk, according to Zelenskyy.
It also comes with the Trump administration linking a Ukraine settlement to a wider bargain on Europe’s security. The Washington Post reported, citing officials, that the administration now believes a deal on Ukraine must come with a broader agreement with Russia on Europe’s future security arrangements.
That linkage has unsettled European governments, which fear Washington could offer Moscow concessions on security in Europe. “We already have a European security architecture in place,” EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said at a meeting of G7 foreign ministers on Monday. “The problem is that Russia is not respecting these agreements.”
For the United States, the talks are a central piece of Trump’s foreign policy agenda. The president vowed to end the conflict when he took office in January 2025, but the goal has remained elusive, and the war has now outlasted the administration’s early timelines.
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Latest developments
Zelenskyy said on Monday that Ukraine’s negotiating team was already in the United Arab Emirates and would propose de-escalatory steps at the meetings. He said the talks must also produce an understanding on how to arrange a trilateral meeting at the leaders’ level “to bring this war to an end fairly and for real.”
“Our negotiating team is already in the United Arab Emirates. The first meeting is tomorrow,” Zelenskyy wrote on social media on Monday. “At the meetings in Abu Dhabi, our team will propose de-escalatory steps, and there must be an understanding of how to arrange a trilateral meeting at the leaders’ level to bring this war to an end fairly and for real. Peace is needed. Security guarantees are needed. Real resources for Ukraine’s postwar recovery are needed.”
He also said Ukrainian forces were “genuinely strengthening Ukraine’s negotiating position” and claimed Russia was suffering “record losses,” a claim Moscow disputes.
Meanwhile, the fighting has not paused for the diplomacy. A truce on striking energy targets announced by Trump last month quickly fell apart. Ukraine has escalated its strikes on Russian oil refineries in recent weeks, while Moscow has pounded Ukraine’s electricity infrastructure and cities.
US officials said Witkoff and Kushner may travel to Moscow and Kyiv after the Abu Dhabi meetings to speak directly with Putin and Zelenskyy.
Background: how the talks stalled
Earlier US-mediated rounds this year produced no breakthrough, and the February session in Geneva was the last before diplomacy was overtaken by the war between the United States, Israel and Iran, which began on February 28 and dominated Washington’s attention for months.
Trump declared on Monday that the war with Iran was militarily “effectively over” after talks with Qatar’s prime minister, a shift that freed diplomatic bandwidth for the Ukraine file. The Abu Dhabi round was announced earlier this month, and the Kremlin confirmed Russia’s participation days later.
The war itself began with Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. Before the invasion, Moscow had demanded the withdrawal of NATO forces from countries that joined the alliance after 1997, a demand the alliance rejected.
Frequently asked questions
When are the Abu Dhabi talks taking place?
The talks are scheduled for Tuesday and Wednesday, November 10–11, 2026, in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates. They are the first three-way, US-brokered negotiations between Russia and Ukraine since February.
Who is leading each delegation?
The United States is represented by special envoy Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner. Russia’s delegation is headed by Kremlin aide Vladimir Medinsky, with Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov taking part for the first time. Ukraine’s team is led by Rustem Umerov.
What are the main issues on the table?
The agenda covers postwar security arrangements for Ukraine, de-escalation, humanitarian measures and steps toward ending the war. The hardest questions are territory — who controls Ukraine’s eastern regions — and what security guarantees Kyiv would receive in return.
Is a peace deal expected this week?
No. US officials have described the round as working-level talks, and Kushner said the meetings could at most “build momentum toward the next phase of negotiations.” No ceasefire or agreement has been announced, and the two sides remain publicly divided on territory.
What to watch next
The outcome of the two days in Abu Dhabi will become clear only in the days that follow: whether the sides agree to another round, whether Witkoff and Kushner travel to Moscow and Kyiv as US officials have suggested, and whether the “flexibility” the US official described in private turns into any movement in public. For now, the talks are a renewed diplomatic effort, not evidence that an agreement has already been reached.
Sources
- AAP, “Russia, Ukraine to meet for US-brokered talks in UAE,” November 10, 2026 — https://aapnews.aap.com.au/news/russia-ukraine-to-meet-for-us-brokered-talks-in-uae
- The Insight International, “Russia, Ukraine and US meet in Abu Dhabi for first peace talks since February,” November 10, 2026 — https://theinsightinternational.com/russia-ukraine-and-us-meet-in-abu-dhabi-for-first-peace-talks-since-february/
- Reuters reporting via AAP and The Insight International; Axios reporting via The Daily Flare, “Ukraine, Russia and US set to resume peace talks in Abu Dhabi,” November 10, 2026 — https://thedailyflare.com/europe/ukraine-russia-and-us-set-to-resume-peace-talks-in-abu-dhabi/
- The Washington Post, via reporting on the Trump administration’s position linking a Ukraine deal to broader European security arrangements.
