Witkoff and Kushner arrive in Moscow for Ukraine peace talks as Putin orders 72-hour pause in Kyiv strikes

Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, the two top U.S. envoys on the Ukraine conflict, landed in Moscow on Saturday in what represented their first trip to the region since January, when they met President Vladimir Putin in the Kremlin. Their visit to Kyiv, planned for Sunday, would be the first time either envoy has traveled to the Ukrainian capital since the war began.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov confirmed that Putin would meet the U.S. delegation and had ordered a halt to strikes on Kyiv for three days, saying the pause was "connected with the preparation for and conduct of the Americans' contacts in Kyiv." Peskov also told reporters there was "no talk of new ideas" to end the conflict, and Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov told Russian state media that the U.S. must take into account battlefield realities "where the situation is changing not in Kyiv's favor," according to CNN.

Before the pause took effect, Russian forces struck two airports near Kyiv overnight, including Boryspil international airport. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said the strikes were "a reaction to discussions and preparations for the possibility of the U.S. side using an aircraft to travel to Ukraine." Zelensky said Ukraine would halt its own airstrikes during the envoys' visit and urged Moscow to do the same; Moscow did not publicly respond to that proposal before the Kremlin announced its own three-day pause. Separately, Russian attacks on Ukraine's southern Dnipropetrovsk region killed five workers at an industrial facility and wounded five others, according to local military administration head Oleksandr Hanzha, as reported by AP and NPR. Russia launched 167 attack drones and ballistic missiles overnight; Ukrainian air defenses shot down or suppressed 128, Ukraine's air force said.