Peace talks will remain stalled until the Ukrainian military leaves Donbass, Russian presidential aide Yury Ushakov has said

The Ukrainian military needs to pull back from Donbass for the peace process to move forward, Russian presidential aide Yury Ushakov has said. Talks between Moscow and Kiev will remain stalled until then, he told journalist Pavel Zarubin, adding that the Ukrainian government knows this.

Russia and Ukraine have held several rounds of talks, including with US mediation, since early 2025, when President Donald Trump returned to the White House. The process has slowed down following the latest US-mediated meeting in Geneva in February.

According to Ushakov, any new meetings will not change the situation unless Ukrainian troops are withdrawn. "Until [Ukraine] makes the step, one can hold some more rounds, dozens of rounds [of talks] but we will remain in the same spot," he said.

"They know in Ukraine that it must be done and they will do it sooner or later," the presidential aide stated. Ushakov also said that Moscow maintains close contacts with Washington when it comes to the peace process, adding that Trump's envoys, Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, could visit Russia "soon."

"The US is now more preoccupied with the Middle East crisis but they are not abandoning the Ukraine issue," he told Zaurbin, while saying that Moscow and Washington "actively communicate by phone."

Earlier this week, Ushakov called a potential Ukrainian withdrawal from Donbass "one serious step" that would greatly advance the settlement process. Military action would cease after that, he stated on Thursday.

The two Donbass republics voted to join Russia together with two other former Ukrainian territories - Kherson and Zaporozhye Regions - in autumn 2022. In March, President Vladimir Putin stated that only between 15% and 17% of the Donetsk People's Republic remains under Kiev's control. In April, the Russian military reported fully liberating the neighboring Lugansk People's Republic.

The Ukrainian leadership has repeatedly refused to both recognize the status of the new Russian regions or to cede any territory to Moscow. It also maintains that recapturing the regions incorporated into Russia is one of its ultimate goals.

(RT.com)