© EPA/ GAVRIIL GRIGOROV / SPUTNIK / KREMLIN POOL The Russian leader says he has no doubts about the professionalism of Trump's special envoy.
Russian dictator Vladimir Putin praised the role of US special envoy Stephen Witkoff in negotiations over the war in Ukraine, saying he reliably conveyed Donald Trump's point of view to the Kremlin after their meetings, Bloomberg reports.
“He conveyed the Russian side’s position to President Trump quite accurately,” Putin told reporters in Beijing, answering a question about Witkoff’s criticism of the United States. “The fact that he accurately and objectively conveys to us the position of the American leadership became absolutely obvious to me during the discussions in Anchorage.”
Witkoff, who attended a summit between the two presidents in Alaska last month, has met with Putin in Russia five times this year, helping Trump reach a deal to end Russia’s war in Ukraine. After the summit, he said Putin and Trump agreed that the United States and other allies “can offer Ukraine effective security guarantees similar to NATO’s Article 5,” which states that an attack on one member of the alliance is an attack on all.
The Kremlin did not confirm this, raising questions about whether Moscow had indeed made such a concession, or whether the American delegation had perhaps misunderstood Putin's willingness to provide such security guarantees to Kyiv.
“Everything we talked about with Mr. Witkoff, we confirmed in full in the presence of President Trump, and he did not deny that this was his position,” Putin said at a press conference in Beijing. “Those who criticize Witkoff are those who do not like this position. But they do not like Trump’s position either, that’s the whole point.”
Putin said Tuesday that a consensus on security guarantees was possible, even as he continued to push for maximalist demands to end Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. He also said the U.S. administration was listening to Moscow and that “mutual understanding is beginning to emerge.”
