# Kushner and Witkoff arrive in Kyiv after talks with Putin as Ukraine–U.S. negotiations begin

*Sunday, September 6, 2026 at 12:06 PM UTC — Hamer Intelligence Services Desk*

**Published**: 2026-09-06T12:06:02.157Z (2h ago)
**Category**: geopolitics | **Region**: Eastern Europe
**Importance**: 9/10
**Sources**: OSINT
**Permalink**: https://hamerintel.com/data/articles/17055.md
**Source**: https://hamerintel.com/summaries

---

**Deck**: Trump associates Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff traveled by train to Kyiv after meeting Vladimir Putin in Moscow and have begun talks with President Volodymyr Zelensky and his team.

Trump‑linked envoys are now part of Ukraine’s wartime diplomacy. Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff arrived in Kyiv by train on 6 September after talks with Vladimir Putin in Moscow and have begun negotiations with President Volodymyr Zelensky and senior Ukrainian officials.

Zelensky announced that Ukraine–U.S. negotiations had started, saying, “Negotiations have begun.” In earlier comments, he said Ukraine wants to bring the war closer to an end and is seeking peace, security guarantees and what he called a “dignified” postwar settlement.

Video and Ukrainian reports show Kushner and Witkoff being greeted in Kyiv by senior figures including intelligence chief Kyrylo Budanov, Defense Minister Rustem Umerov, lawmaker David Arakhamia and UN ambassador Sergiy Kyslytsya. Ukrainian outlets describe them as envoys of Donald Trump rather than of the current U.S. administration.

Their arrival came under wartime constraints. Zelensky said Russian strikes prevented the American delegation from flying into Kyiv, even though Ukrainian airports were ready to receive them, forcing Kushner and Witkoff to come by rail instead.

Before traveling to Ukraine, the pair spent about three hours with Putin in the Kremlin, discussing sanctions relief and possible peace terms, according to earlier reporting. Witkoff called the conversation “memorable,” while Western media accounts said Moscow refused to abandon its military objectives and rejected broader Ukrainian ceasefire proposals as never having been discussed.

Zelensky outlined a format for the Kyiv talks that includes multiple rounds. He said there would be one session with the U.S. representatives, followed by another with European partners, and then several more sessions that were not fully audible in public video of his remarks. Budanov said representatives of France, Germany and the United Kingdom were in Kyiv alongside the American delegation.

For officials in Kyiv, that structure is one way to keep a new channel from cutting across existing ones. By bringing European partners into the same diplomatic setting, Ukraine is trying to ensure that discussions with Trump‑linked envoys sit alongside, rather than replace, its talks with Western governments.

What matters now is whether any concrete proposals emerge from these meetings, how governments in Washington, Paris, Berlin and London react to the Kushner–Witkoff role, and whether Russia adjusts its public or military posture after hosting the same visitors in Moscow days earlier.