Kremlin envoy set to visit Miami for talks on US peace plan for Ukraine

A Kremlin envoy will travel to Florida to discuss a U.S.-proposed plan to end the war in Ukraine, a U.S. official said Thursday, part of the back-and-forth diplomacy as the Trump administration pushes for a potential deal.

Kirill Dmitriev, who heads Russia's sovereign wealth fund, is set to meet with U.S. President Donald Trump's envoy, Steve Witkoff, and Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner in Miami on Saturday, according to an American official who spoke on condition of anonymity to preview a meeting that hasn't yet been publicly announced.

The official said Witkoff and Kushner will sit down with Dmitriev, after meetings with Ukrainian and European officials in Berlin earlier this week, in which they discussed U.S. security guarantees for Kyiv, territorial concessions and other aspects of the American-authored plan aimed at ending the war.

Asked about the meeting in Miami, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Thursday that Moscow was preparing for contacts with the U.S. to learn about the results of the meetings in Berlin, but he didn't give further details.

Trump has unleashed an extensive diplomatic push to end nearly four years of fighting following Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine that began on Feb. 24, 2022, but Washington's efforts have run into sharply conflicting demands by Moscow and Kyiv.

Russian President Vladimir Putin warned on Wednesday that Moscow would seek to extend its gains in Ukraine if Kyiv and its Western allies reject the Kremlin's demands in peace talks.

Putin wants all the areas in four key regions captured by his forces, as well as the Crimean Peninsula, which was illegally annexed in 2014, to be recognized as Russian territory. He also has demanded that Ukraine withdraw from some areas in eastern Ukraine that Moscow's forces haven't captured yet, which Ukraine has rejected.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, asked Thursday about his comments last week that were interpreted as him renouncing Ukraine's NATO bid, and if he was willing to change Ukraine's constitution to remove the reference to joining NATO, said he saw no reason to do that.

''My words cannot be interpreted in any other way,'' Zelenskyy said. ''Our position remains unchanged.'' While the United States doesn't see Ukraine in NATO ''for now,'' he said. ''Politicians change.''

Zelenskyy said Ukrainian officials were expected to hold negotiations in the U.S. on Friday or Saturday.

''We have progress in our dialogue with the American side regarding some of our points, they also speak with Russian side,'' Zelenskyy said during a visit to Brussels where EU leaders were set to decide whether to use tens of billions of euros in frozen Russian assets to underwrite a loan to meet Ukraine's military and financial needs over the next two years.

''We are in the war and United States are decision-makers, who can really stop Putin and I count on this," Zelenskyy said. ''I really count on pressure from United States. Putin does not want to stop this war, but he can if United States will pressure more.''

Ukraine's air force said Russia fired 82 drones of various types at Ukraine overnight, 63 of which were intercepted or jammed.

In Cherkasy, Russian drones that targeted critical infrastructure wounded six people and left parts of the city without electricity, regional administration head Ihor Taburets said. Russian drones also wounded four people in Kryvyi Rih and seven near Odesa, according to local officials.

In Russia's Rostov region, three people were killed by Ukrainian drones overnight, including two crew members of a cargo ship that was hit in Rostov-on-Don and a man who died in Bataysk. At least 10 others were wounded, according to local officials.

The Russian Defense Ministry said its air defenses intercepted 47 Ukrainian drones overnight.

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