The United States is once again stepping up diplomatic efforts to end the war in Ukraine, following a period of stagnation caused by the conflict with Iran. A new round of US-Ukraine-Russia talks is scheduled to take place on November 10 and 11 in Abu Dhabi.
These will be the first talks involving the three sides since February this year.
Ahead of the negotiations, US President Donald Trump told CBS’s 60 Minutes that he believes “we are very close to a deal” and that the war “will end soon”.
However, expectations of any significant breakthrough in this week’s talks remain low. Here are five key reasons why.
Negotiations as a Means of Achieving Objectives
One of the main obstacles to substantial progress can be summed up in a single word: Russia.
While the claim that Russia could end the war at any moment is, to some extent, self-evident, it is also accurate. President Vladimir Putin launched the full-scale invasion in February 2022 and could, at the very least, stop the fighting by accepting what Kyiv and the West have been demanding: a ceasefire that would leave the front lines where they currently stand.
But he has given no indication that he is willing to do so. Analysts warn that Moscow has used previous negotiations to buy time and keep hopes of peace alive, while refusing to make concessions.
“For the West, negotiations are a means of ending the war; for Putin, they may be a means of winning it,” wrote Sam Greene, a professor at the Russia Institute at King’s College London and the author of a book on Putin, on November 8.
Western policymakers need to understand “the difference between Putin’s desire for negotiations and his desire to negotiate”, he wrote.
Donbas
When he launched the full-scale invasion, Putin sought to subjugate Ukraine and weaken the West. Experts say his desire to seize territory is secondary to these broader objectives.
Nevertheless, ahead of the Abu Dhabi talks, one of the biggest obstacles to progress is a part of the Donetsk region in Donbas that Russian forces have failed to capture, despite years of exceptionally bloody fighting.
The Kremlin says Russian control over the entire Donbas is a precondition for any peace agreement and that this is not up for negotiation. Moscow has warned that it will continue trying to seize the remaining territory by force if it cannot obtain it through diplomatic negotiations.
Trump hinted that such an outcome could be on the horizon when he told CBS that the war would end with “a different Ukraine”. However, he did not explain which territory Kyiv might be forced to give up, or whether he meant formally recognising Russian control over it — something Kyiv considers unacceptable.
Russia currently controls around 20 per cent of Ukraine’s territory, including the Crimean Peninsula, which it occupied in 2014.
As for Donbas, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has repeatedly insisted that Russia must not be handed territory that Ukrainian forces have managed to defend. There is no indication that Kyiv will change this position.
Another reason Kyiv is unwilling to give ground is that the part of the Donetsk region still under Ukrainian control forms a “fortress belt” with important defensive infrastructure. Surrendering this territory would leave Ukraine more vulnerable to future attacks.
A “Grand and Magnificent Deal”
Trump has been trying to broker a peace agreement since the beginning of his current term in January 2025, having repeatedly claimed that he could end the war within a day or two.
On several occasions, the United States has called for a full ceasefire as the first step towards peace. Russia has repeatedly rejected this idea, insisting that the fighting can only stop once a comprehensive peace agreement has been reached.
However, on November 5, Trump suggested a much broader initiative: a “grand and magnificent deal” that “will include more than Ukraine”.
Trump’s son-in-law and special envoy, Jared Kushner, who will represent the United States alongside Steve Witkoff at the Abu Dhabi talks, elaborated on this idea in a post on X. He wrote about “the need for a broader European security architecture that can help create the conditions for lasting peace”.
Kushner assured that any new agreement “must fully respect sovereignty, territorial integrity, and the right of every nation to make its own decisions independently. Each country will retain authority over its own security and alliances, and no nation will have the right to veto another nation’s sovereign choices”.
In another post on X on November 9, Kushner said that ahead of the trilateral talks, he and Witkoff would “meet with our partners from Ukraine, the European Union, NATO, Germany, France, the United Kingdom, and Italy to continue the consultations and close coordination we have been conducting on European security and Ukraine’s future after the war”.
He added that “achieving a comprehensive and lasting agreement will also require direct engagement between Russia and our European partners on the broader security issues that affect them”.
However, Trump and Kushner’s statements caused concern in Kyiv and beyond, partly because some of their wording echoed the Kremlin’s long-standing demands for Russia to have significant influence over Europe’s security architecture, decades after the Soviet withdrawal from Eastern Europe and the collapse of the Soviet Union.
This raised concerns that Europe — which Russia insists will not be directly involved in the Abu Dhabi talks — could be excluded from discussions about its own future.
“We already have a European security architecture,” EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas told reporters, adding that “for any agreement to be implemented, the European Union will have to be part of it”.
On November 9, Kallas said Russia was “bombing civilians” while “pretending to negotiate”, adding that “we have seen no goodwill from the Russian side”.
In any case, Ukraine and the EU are likely to be wary of any discussions that risk excluding Europe or sidelining objectives they consider more urgent, such as stopping the fighting and guaranteeing Ukraine’s security.
Trying to reach an agreement that would encompass the entire continent could make even smaller steps towards peace more difficult.
The War Through the Winter
The talks are taking place one week after American voters dealt Trump’s party a major defeat in the midterm elections, handing control of both chambers of Congress — the Senate and the House of Representatives — to the Democrats. Until then, both chambers had been controlled by Republicans.
However, the new Congress will not convene until January 3, giving the White House a window of opportunity to reach an agreement.
But reaching a deal would require the parties to make concessions. Trump may have hinted at what Ukraine would be expected to concede when he said that it would have to give up some of its territory.
Nevertheless, Washington’s ability to pressure Kyiv into accepting major concessions is limited. The political shift in Washington, combined with Ukraine’s battlefield successes and its campaign of attacks against Russian energy and military infrastructure, could mean that Ukraine is heading into its harshest winter yet.
Meanwhile, for now, Russia does not appear likely to face any significant new pressure. Analysts say Moscow will probably continue its relentless attacks on power plants and other critical Ukrainian infrastructure, as well as strikes that kill civilians, throughout the winter. Its aim is to force Kyiv towards a compromise in 2027.
The aftermath of Russia’s deadly attack on Ukraine last week.
“I do not believe at all that we will have peace before the spring,” British analyst and author Mark Galeotti said on his podcast late last month. “If for no other reason, Putin will think: ‘Let’s hit the Ukrainians through another winter’”.
Greene wrote on his blog that Russia would rely on its ability to inflict a “catastrophic” winter on Ukrainians, while hoping that next spring’s elections in France and Germany would weaken European support for Kyiv.
By May or June, “Moscow is likely to feel that its position has reached its most favourable point and will try to consolidate the gains it has made”, he wrote. As for this week’s talks, he added: “My baseline assumption is that Abu Dhabi will produce nothing substantial”.
A Grim Track Record
To understand that Russia is unwilling to make concessions, one only needs to look at Putin’s statements and those of other Russian officials.
Another possible indication is the fact that Moscow’s delegation at the talks will be led by Vladimir Medinsky, a Kremlin adviser, historian and former culture minister. He has not only expressed Putin’s views on Ukraine but has also helped shape them, repeatedly questioning the country’s full sovereignty.
Medinsky, who has echoed Putin’s revisionist views on Ukrainian history and other issues, is widely reported to have played a significant role in drafting a July 2021 article that, at least in retrospect, clearly revealed Putin’s intentions towards Ukraine, seven months before the full-scale invasion began.
He has also led Moscow’s delegation in several previous rounds of talks with Ukraine over the past two years, including the most recent trilateral meeting, held in Geneva in February.
In Kyiv and across the West, Medinsky has been viewed as a representative who simply repeats Russian demands, showing little flexibility in negotiations that ended without any progress towards peace.
“When you want serious negotiations, you send serious people,” Boris Bondarev, a former Russian diplomat who resigned in protest against the invasion of Ukraine and now lives outside Russia, told Radio Free Europe in 2025.
“Medinsky? He is part of a team of amateurs, second- or third-rate, and should not be taken seriously.”
