Brussels 23.01.2026 The diplomatic talks startted today in Abu Dhabi and are scheduled to continue over two days, as part of ongoing efforts to promote dialogue and identify political solutions to the crisis,” the UAE’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said territorial disputes would be a central issue in the discussions, and underlined that “the most important element is that Russia should be ready to end this war, which it started”.
In a statement shared on Telegram, Zelenskyy said he was in regular contact with the Ukrainian delegation, but it was too early to draw conclusions from today’s talks.
The discussions in the Emirati capital came a day after president Zelenskyy met with president Trump at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland – and hours after U.S. envoy Steve Witkoff held late-night talks with Russian leader Vladimir Putin at the Kremlin.
The talks between Putin and Witkoff lasted nearly four hours but did not resolve the main contradictions to reaching a deal – namely, territorial disputes regarding Donbass, and security guarantees.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that Russia’s insistence on Ukraine yielding all of Donbas – including the 20 percent of Donetsk région which is still under Ukrainian control – was “a very important condition”.
Kremlin foreign affairs adviser Yury Ushakov, who participated in Putin’s meeting with Witkoff, also said “it was reaffirmed that reaching a long-term settlement can’t be expected without solving the territorial issue”.
Meanwhile, Russia’s TASS news agency reported that the discussions in Abu Dhabi included possible buffer zones and monitoring mechanisms.
For its part, Ukraine has demanded security guarantees from its Western allies, mainly the U.S. should a deal to end the war be signed, in order to deter Russia from further military actions.
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