{"id":608690,"date":"2025-12-03T03:02:15","date_gmt":"2025-12-03T03:02:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/608690\/"},"modified":"2025-12-03T03:02:15","modified_gmt":"2025-12-03T03:02:15","slug":"ukraine-war-briefing-peace-push-fizzles-as-witkoff-leaves-moscow-with-no-sign-of-deal-ukraine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/608690\/","title":{"rendered":"Ukraine war briefing: Peace push fizzles as Witkoff leaves Moscow with no sign of deal | Ukraine"},"content":{"rendered":"
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    Steve Witkoff was reported to have flown out of Moscow on Tuesday night after Kremlin aides said no progress was made towards ending the Ukraine war<\/a>.<\/strong> It came after two weeks of diplomatic chaos and haggling beginning with the Russian leaking of a 28-point wishlist that Moscow had discussed with the US, followed by frenzied efforts involving Ukraine and Europe to produce a counter-proposal more acceptable to Kyiv.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n

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    Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov said that after their five-hour meeting the two sides were \u201cneither further nor closer to resolving the crisis in Ukraine<\/strong>. There is a lot of work to be done.\u201d On Tuesday, a video feed showed V<\/strong>ladimir Putin asking Witkoff, Donald Trump\u2019s envoy, about a short tour of Moscow he had taken before the meeting, with Witkoff calling it a \u201cmagnificent city\u201d. The feed then cut out.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n

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    Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on Tuesday that he was worried the US could lose interest in the Ukrainian peace process<\/strong>. \u201cIf somebody from our allies is tired, I\u2019m afraid,\u201d Zelenskyy told an event in Dublin. \u201cIt\u2019s the goal of Russia to withdraw the interest of America from this situation.\u201d The Ukrainian president said he was \u201cawaiting signals\u201d from the US delegation after its meeting with Putin and was \u201cready for a meeting with President Trump. Everything depends on today\u2019s discussions.\u201d US reports suggested Witkoff might meet Zelenskyy after departing Moscow.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n

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    Vladimir Putin used Tuesday\u2019s talks to threaten that Russia was ready for war with Europe<\/strong>. \u201cEurope is preventing the US administration from achieving peace on Ukraine,\u201d Putin claimed without evidence in remarks to Russian state media, adding: \u201cRussia does not intend to fight Europe, but if Europe starts, we are ready right now.\u201d Putin did not clarify which European demands he found unacceptable. \u201cThey are on the side of war,\u201d Putin said of European powers.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n

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    Ukrainian authorities have arrested a British military instructor accused of spying for Russia and plotting assassinations<\/strong>, writes Serena Richards<\/a>. Ross David Cutmore, 40, from Dunfermline, was allegedly recruited by Russia\u2019s intelligence service, the FSB, to \u201ccarry out targeted killings on the territory of Ukraine\u201d between 2024 and 2025. A spokesperson for the Foreign Office said: \u201cWe are providing consular assistance to a British man who is detained in Ukraine. We remain in close contact with the Ukrainian authorities.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/li>\n

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    A Russian-flagged tanker claiming to be carrying sunflower oil to Georgia reported a drone attack off the Turkish coast on Tuesday<\/strong> in which its 13 crew members were unharmed, Turkey\u2019s maritime authority and the Tribeca shipping agency said. Ukraine said it had nothing to do with the attack of the Midvolga-2, which is described by online registries as an oil and chemical products tanker<\/strong>. Turkey has reported three Russia-linked tankers coming under attack off its coast in the Black Sea in recent days. A Ukrainian security source told AFP its forces had used naval drones to hit two of the tankers, on Friday last week, claiming that both vessels were \u201ccovertly transporting Russian oil\u201d.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n

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    Vladimir Putin on Tuesday condemned the attacks as piracy and threatened to take measures against tankers of countries that help Ukraine, as well as intensifying Russia\u2019s attacks on Ukrainian facilities and vessels<\/strong>. Another oil tanker, the Panamanian-flagged Mersin, was struck off the coast of Dakar by four external explosions last week after it left Russia, Agence France-Presse reported, citing the ship\u2019s Turkish owners and the Senegalese authorities. Expert opinions were mixed as to whether Ukraine was involved in that case, AFP reported.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n

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    The European Commission plans to make a legal proposal this week to use frozen Russian assets to fund Ukraine<\/strong> while also leaving open the possibility of borrowing on financial markets or mixing the two options, four sources told Reuters on Tuesday. It will be discussed by the EU executive on Wednesday. EU leaders agreed in October to meet Ukraine\u2019s \u201cpressing financial needs\u201d for the next two years but stopped short of endorsing a plan to use \u20ac140bn in frozen Russian sovereign assets in Europe as a loan for Kyiv, due to fierce Belgian government objections that because Belgium hosts the Euroclear depository holding most of the Russian assets, it could be at risk from legal retaliation if they are seized.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Steve Witkoff was reported to have flown out of Moscow on Tuesday night after Kremlin aides said no…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":608691,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7654],"tags":[2000,299,657],"class_list":{"0":"post-608690","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ukraine","8":"tag-eu","9":"tag-europe","10":"tag-ukraine"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115653413700927720","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/608690","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=608690"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/608690\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/608691"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=608690"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=608690"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=608690"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}