US‑brokered peace talks between Ukraine and Russia set to resume this week in Abu Dhabi

A new round of United States‑mediated peace talks on ending Russia’s war in Ukraine is set to take place this week in Abu Dhabi , senior officials confirmed Monday, even as fighting and deadly long-range missile strikes continue across Ukrainian territory. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said his negotiating team is ready for substantive discussions aimed at halting nearly four years of war.

The trilateral talks , involving delegations from Ukraine, Russia, and the United States, are now scheduled for Wednesday and Thursday in the United Arab Emirates capital after being postponed from the weekend due to scheduling changes in U.S.–Russia preparatory meetings.

The talks build on a first round held in January that brought the three sides together in the same room for the first publicly acknowledged trilateral negotiations since the February 2022 invasion. Senior officials focused on possible parameters for ending the war and the security conditions required to sustain any deal. Ukrainian delegates described those discussions as “constructive,” though no agreement was reached.

A central and persisting point of contention remains the status of Ukrainian territory that Russia occupies. Moscow has demanded control over the Donbas region and other areas it has seized, a demand Ukraine has rejected, insisting that its territorial integrity and sovereignty remain non‑negotiable.

Another unresolved issue involves postwar security guarantees . U.S. officials have reportedly proposed a framework that would bind Ukraine’s security arrangements with Western allies after the conflict, but Russia’s foreign minister has publicly rejected significant parts of those assurances, calling them ineffective and ideologically hostile.

The talks come against the backdrop of continued war on the ground. Russian drone and missile strikes have battered Ukrainian cities and infrastructure in recent weeks. A Russian attack on a miner bus in Dnipropetrovsk killed at least a dozen people amid bitter winter conditions, while strikes on power and energy systems have left millions without heat and electricity. Ukrainian authorities have described the bombardments as efforts to “weaponize winter.”

In Kyiv’s efforts to counter Russian use of technology in warfare, Defence Minister Mykhailo Fedorov said Ukrainian authorities are blocking unauthorized use of Starlink satellite services that Russia might exploit to steer drones. Elon Musk confirmed on social media that steps taken to restrict that access appear to be effective.

U.S. mediation efforts have included multiple contacts between U.S. and Russian envoys outside the main trilateral forum. A preparatory meeting in Miami between President Trump’s special envoy and a Kremlin representative was described by both sides as productive, though details were not publicly disclosed.