CIA Director John Ratcliffe, during a secret visit to Moscow, proposed a trilateral summit involving US President Donald Trump, Russian President Vladimir Putin, and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. This was reported by Qazaqyia.kz citing Axios.
According to two sources of the publication, Ratcliffe visited Moscow on Tuesday. One of the goals of the visit was to determine whether Russian intelligence chiefs could convince Putin to return to negotiations with Ukraine mediated by the United States.
On Friday, US officials informed Zelensky of the results of the Moscow talks and the proposal for a trilateral summit. The Trump administration had previously made a similar initiative: Ukraine supported it, but Russia refused.
For Ratcliffe, this was his first personal involvement in diplomatic efforts to resolve the conflict between Russia and Ukraine. The CIA officially declined to comment on the content of his talks.
Following the publication, Russian presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that a meeting between Putin, Trump, and Zelensky could take place only after the main conditions of a peace settlement are agreed upon, RIA Novosti reports.
"A summit of Putin, Trump, and Zelensky is possible only to finalize agreements," Peskov said.
The Kremlin representative also said that Moscow remains open to negotiations between Russian and Ukrainian delegations in Turkey, but does not yet see prerequisites for their resumption.
"Moscow maintains openness to negotiations of the delegations of Russia and Ukraine in Turkey, but there are no prerequisites for them yet," he said.
According to Peskov, possible agreements on Ukraine cannot be a "primitive deal," since the settlement process involves a large number of complex issues.
US officials informed Volodymyr Zelensky of Ratcliffe's talks in Moscow and the proposal for a trilateral summit. The publication notes that Kyiv supports this meeting format.
Zelensky himself thanked the United States for the "necessary tone of conversation with Russia."
"The Trump administration is promoting a realistic vision of what needs to be done and what should be achieved," the Ukrainian president said.