US President Donald Trump’s envoy Steve Witkoff is expected to visit Russia in the “near future,” Russian presidential envoy Kirill Dmitriev said on Wednesday, May 20.
According to Reuters, the comments were reported by a Kremlin pool reporter during Dmitriev’s visit to China alongside Kremlin leader Vladimir Putin.
According to Russian media, in addition to Dmitriev, Putin is accompanied in China by Rosneft CEO Igor Sechin, Gazprom chief Alexei Miller, oligarch Oleg Deripaska, Novatek co-owner Gennady Timchenko, and Leonid Mikhelson, chairman of Russia’s largest independent gas producer.
Also expected to join the delegation are Central Bank governor Elvira Nabiullina, Sberbank CEO German Gref, VTB chief Andrei Kostin, Roscosmos head Dmitry Bakanov, and VEB chairman Igor Shuvalov.
Witkoff became one of Trump’s key negotiators on major international crises, including talks related to the Iran war and diplomatic efforts aimed at ending Russia’s full-scale war against Ukraine, now in its fifth year.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said on May 8 that he expects envoys from Trump to visit Ukraine in the coming weeks as Kyiv and Washington attempt to revive stalled negotiations aimed at ending Russia’s full-scale invasion.
“We are coordinating the schedule of necessary visits and expect representatives of the American President at the turn of spring-summer,” Zelensky said.
“We hope that this time it will be possible to realize the plans and activate diplomacy,” he added.
Rustem Umerov, head of Kyiv’s delegation in US-led peace talks and secretary of Ukraine’s National Security and Defense Council (RNBO), had held meetings in the US with Witkoff and Jared Kushner on May 7. Later, he reported to Zelensky that the talks were focused on prisoner exchanges, diplomatic efforts to end the war, and Ukraine’s growing international drone cooperation.
So far, negotiations over the war in Ukraine have failed to produce a breakthrough. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said that while the US has attempted to facilitate a peace process, these efforts have not led to a “fruitful outcome for a variety of reasons.”
“We remain prepared to play that role if it can be productive. We don’t want to waste our time and invest time and energy into an effort that’s not moving forward,” Rubio said.
The announcement comes amid continued diplomatic activity involving Moscow, Washington and Beijing, including Putin’s ongoing visit to China following Trump’s recent summit with Chinese leader Xi Jinping in Beijing. Trump later confirmed he discussed Ukraine with Xi during the summit.
CNN reported that Xi has described China-Russia relations as a force of “calm amid chaos” during talks with Putin in Beijing.
On Tuesday, the Financial Times reported that Xi told Trump during talks in Beijing last week that Putin may ultimately regret launching his full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Trump and Beijing’s foreign ministry both denied the claim later.