Witkoff and Kushner set to visit Moscow then Kyiv on Sunday

U.S. President Donald Trump's special envoys Steven Witkoff and Jared Kushner are set to travel to Moscow and Kyiv on Sunday in a bid to revive negotiations aimed at ending the Ukraine conflict, according to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. The details of the meetings have not been disclosed, but a U.S. official has confirmed that the goal of the trip is to secure a diplomatic resolution to the ongoing war.

Russian state news agency TASS reports that Witkoff and Kushner plan to visit Moscow and Kyiv on September 5-6. The two have been instrumental U.S. mediators in the stalled Ukraine peace talks. Witkoff has visited Moscow multiple times in 2025 and early 2026 for talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin and also met with Zelenskyy in the U.S., Germany, and France.

This will mark their first visit to Kyiv. Following Trump's return to office in early 2025, the U.S. intensified efforts to broker a Russia-Ukraine peace agreement centered on territorial concessions, security assurances for Ukraine, and postwar reconstruction. Initially, Washington applied considerable pressure on Kyiv to accept these proposals, but by early 2026, the talks stalled.

Recently, the U.S. has ramped up its engagement with Moscow, with CIA Director John Ratcliffe visiting Russia in late August to urge Russia to cut its military and economic support to Iran and to refrain from escalating tensions with America's NATO allies.