Optimism rises over US, Ukraine talks on peace deal
US and Ukrainian officials met in Florida to discuss the outlines of the peace agreement with Russia. During the meeting, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said he expected progress toward ending the war that has been going on for more than three years.
“This is about creating a path forward that will leave Ukraine sovereign, independent and prosperous, and that’s why we expect to make even more progress today,” Rubio said in Hallandale Beach, Florida, where the meeting took place. he said.
Sunday’s discussions followed nearly two weeks of talks that began with a U.S. peace plan that critics say initially supports Russia, which launched the Ukraine conflict with a 2022 invasion.
The meeting between the Ukrainian delegation and the American side on steps to achieve a just peace has already started in the USA. I am in constant contact with the President of Ukraine. We have clear directives and priorities: protecting Ukraine… pic.twitter.com/herwCpylWd— Rustem Umerov (@rustem_umerov) November 30, 2025
US President Donald Trump expressed his disappointment in not being able to end the war.
As a presidential candidate, he promised to do it in one day and said he was surprised it was so difficult, given what he called a strong relationship with Russian President Vladimir Putin, who has largely resisted concessions to stop the conflict.
Trump’s team pressured Ukraine to make significant concessions, including ceding territory to Russia.
The talks took a turn on Sunday when the leadership of the Ukrainian side changed.
A new chief negotiator, national security council secretary Rustem Umerov, chaired talks on behalf of Ukraine after the resignation Friday of former team leader Andriy Yermak, who was Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s private secretary, amid a domestic corruption scandal.
As the meeting began, Umerov thanked the USA and its officials for their support.
“The USA hears us, the USA supports us, the USA walks next to us,” Umerov said in English.
Representing the US side, special envoy Steve Witkoff and Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner were also present.
Witkoff is expected to meet with his Russian counterparts later this week.
The meetings took place at Shell Bay, a private club near Miami developed by Witkoff’s real estate company.
Zelenskiy had said that he expected the results of previous meetings in Geneva to be “determined” on Sunday.
In Geneva, Ukraine submitted a counter-proposal to proposals that US Army Secretary Dan Driscoll presented to leaders in Kiev two weeks ago.
Facing a domestic political crisis fueled by a massive corruption investigation in the energy sector, Ukraine’s leadership is trying to push back on Kremlin-friendly terms as Russian forces advance on the front lines of the war.
Last week, Zelenskiy warned Ukrainians, who have suffered widespread outages from Russian airstrikes on its energy system, that his country was in its toughest moment yet, but vowed not to cut a bad deal.
Ukraine’s first deputy foreign minister, Sergiy Kyslytsya, who was also part of the delegation, wrote to X from Miami on Sunday: “As a weather expert would say, there is inherent difficulty in making predictions because the atmosphere is a chaotic system where small changes can have big consequences.”
Türkiye’s Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan told Germany’s Welt am Sonntag newspaper that Russia and Ukraine are increasingly willing to reach a peace agreement.
Fidan said, “After four years of exhausting war, the parties are more prepared to reach peace than before.”
“They saw the extent of human suffering and destruction and understood their own limitations,” he added.
Fidan stated that Türkiye now understands that Putin is ready to accept a peace agreement under certain conditions, and this attitude has been conveyed to the Ukrainian side.
Turkey was involved “in certain aspects of this,” he added, noting that the war was exacting a heavy toll on Russia as well.
with DPA
