U.S. and Russian negotiators are holding talks on Monday in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, to discuss a partial cease-fire in Ukraine.
White House national security adviser Mike Waltz told the “Face the Nation” program on CBS on Sunday that the U.S., Russian, and Ukrainian delegations were all in the same building in Riyadh.
Waltz said the negotiators would also discuss “the line of control” in Ukraine, and “verification measures, peacekeeping, freezing the lines where they are.”
He said “confidence-building measures,” including the possible return of Ukrainian children taken by Russia, were also being discussed.
Ukrainian negotiators are set to meet the U.S. team separately, following its talks with the Russian delegation.
The U.S. team is led by Andrew Peek, a senior director at the White House National Security Council, and Michael Anton, a senior State Department official.
Witkoff Expects ‘Real Progress’
Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff, speaking on “Fox News Sunday,” said he expected some real progress at the Riyadh talks, “particularly as it affects a Black Sea ceasefire on ships between both countries, and from that you’ll naturally gravitate into a full-on shooting ceasefire.”Kyiv and Moscow agreed in principle last week to a limited cease-fire after President Donald Trump spoke with Russian President Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
The White House said the cease-fire would protect energy and infrastructure. Kremlin Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on March 21 that the agreement only covered energy facilities, and said Putin had already suspended attacks on them for 30 days.
Peskov accused Ukraine of attacking a gas metering station in Sudzha, a town in Russia’s Kursk region.
Ukraine’s military has denied the allegation and blamed Russian forces for shelling the Sudzha gas metering station. Peskov said that claim was absurd.
Russia launched a drone attack on the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv, on Saturday, which killed at least seven people.
Zelenskyy said, in a televised statement on Sunday evening, “Since March 11, a proposal for an unconditional ceasefire has been on the table, and these attacks could have already stopped. But it is Russia that continues all this.”
“There must be more pressure on Russia to stop this terror,” he added.
On Sunday night, the Ukrainian Air Force claimed Russian troops fired 99 attack and decoy drones into Ukraine, of which 57 were shot down, and 36 were lost from radar.
Ukrainians ‘Fully Constructive’
“Our team is working in a fully constructive manner, and the discussion is quite useful. The work of the delegations continues,” Zelenskyy said. “But no matter what we’re discussing with our partners right now, Putin must be pushed to issue a real order to stop the strikes, because the one who brought this war must be the one to take it back.”Zelenskyy has said he wants railways and ports to be covered by a cease-fire.
Ukrainian state railway operator Ukrzaliznytsia said, on Telegram, that its online services came under a “massive targeted cyber attack” on Sunday.
The company said the cyberattack affected the online purchase of tickets, rather than train movements.
It wrote, “The railway continues to operate despite physical attacks on the infrastructure, and even the most vile cyber attacks cannot stop it.”
