President Trump’s special envoy arrived in Russia on Friday to try to make progress on cease-fire talks in its war with Ukraine, meeting with President Vladimir V. Putin in St. Petersburg.
Around the same time, Ukraine’s allies met in Brussels to announce new military support for Kyiv and expressed doubt about Moscow’s commitment to peace.
The pair of meetings highlighted the widening approaches to the crisis between the U.S. and Europe.
Russia shows little sign that it is interested in peace, the German defense minister, Boris Pistorius, said in Brussels. He announced a surge of military support for Ukraine after a meeting of the Ukraine Defense Contact Group, representing some 50 countries, including the United States.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth attended virtually, as did President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine and several other ministers.
Russia must understand that Ukraine can continue the fight, Mr. Pistorius said. “Given Russia’s ongoing aggression against Ukraine, we must concede peace in Ukraine appears to be out of reach in the immediate future,” he said. “We will ensure that Ukraine continues to benefit from our joint military support.” Russia, he said, “is still not interested in peace.”
Mr. Trump has demanded that both sides agree to an immediate 30-day cease-fire, hoping to extend that pause into negotiations on a more permanent settlement of the long war. Ukraine has agreed, but Mr. Putin has not, instead asking to remove some of the Western sanctions against his country first in addition to broader commitments that “remove the root causes of this crisis.”
Mr. Trump’s special envoy on negotiations with Russia, Steve Witkoff, planned to meet with Mr. Putin, likely for many hours — as long “as President Putin needs,” according to Dmitri S. Peskov, the Kremlin’s spokesman.
It would be their third session since Moscow and Washington began working to reset the relationship and find ways to end the war in Ukraine.
Mr. Peskov said the meeting is unlikely to produce decisive results but emphasized that work has been ongoing to “normalize the relationship.” Ukraine and a potential meeting between Mr. Trump and Mr. Putin are likely to be on the agenda, according to the Russian state news agency Tass.
Upon arriving in St. Petersburg, Mr. Witkoff met with Kirill Dmitriev, Mr. Putin’s special envoy for investment and international economic affairs, according to Tass.
In Brussels, European nations renewed statements of support for Ukraine. It will need Western financial and military backing even if the conflict ends to try to ensure that Russia does not try to complete its conquest of Ukraine down the road.
Defense Secretary John Healey of Britain, who co-chaired the meeting with Mr. Pistorius, announced more than 21 billion euros ($23.8 billion) in pledges of military aid to Ukraine from NATO allies and a focus on providing Ukraine with more air defense, drones, equipment and the capacity to repair it inside the country.
“We sending a signal to Putin, but we are also sending a message to Ukraine, and we are saying to Ukraine, we stand with you in the fight, and we will stand with you in the peace,” Mr. Healey said.
It was the 27th meeting of what is known as the contact group, organized initially by the United States. Washington has ceded the chairmanship of the group, but Mr. Hegseth participated in the discussion, Mr. Pistorius said.
Mr. Pistorius said the American aid to Ukraine continues. Ukraine’s defense minister, Rustem Umerov, praised the United States as Ukraine’s “prime partner” and said that Mr. Hegseth’s participation “means that U.S. is continuing its security assistance and is beside us.”
For the future, however, Mr. Pistorius was careful. “In the weeks to come we will see what’s going to happen with a U.S. participation, with the U.S. support,” he said. “I am not able to have a look in the crystal ball.”
On Thursday, also in Brussels, Mr. Healey co-chaired a meeting of countries supporting Ukraine to discuss options for a possible “reassurance force” to help Ukraine secure its future after any peace deal and to help deter Russia in the years ahead. Those plans remain notional, but France and Britain want to have detailed options for European participation, while also insisting that the United States provide key elements like air cover, without troops on the ground.
Mr. Witkoff recently became the first senior American official to travel to Moscow to meet with Mr. Putin since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in early 2022. The Biden administration cut off contact with Mr. Putin and accused him of committing crimes against humanity in Ukraine.
Delegated by Mr. Trump as his trusted envoy, Mr. Witkoff has seemed to pursue a different approach. After his first meeting in the Kremlin, Mr. Witkoff said that he had tried to develop “a friendship, a relationship” with Mr. Putin.
Axios first reported the news of Mr. Witkoff’s trip to Russia.
Mr. Witkoff is expected to be in Oman on Saturday for talks with the foreign minister of Iran on the equally vexed issue of Iran’s growing program of nuclear enrichment.
