The Kremlin said Wednesday that the leak of a phone call between senior U.S. and Russian officials was intended to disrupt peace talks, and warned it was premature to say that a deal to end its war in Ukraine was close.
President Donald Trump, whose envoy Steve Witkoff will visit Moscow next week, said that his peace plan had been "fine-tuned" and that he had no deadline for an agreement after earlier pressuring Kyiv to endorse a proposal by Thanksgiving.
Kyiv and its allies indicated they were broadly happy with changes to the plan, though key sticking points remained. As attention shifted to Russia, which has held to its maximalist demands, the leak added to questions about the Kremlin's role in negotiations.
Yuri Ushakov, a foreign policy adviser to Russian President Vladimir Putin, suggested the leak of his conversation with Witkoff was an attempt to interfere in the peace talks. “It is unlikely that this is done to improve relations,” he said.
Witkoff advised his Russian counterpart on how to best appeal to Trump about a peace plan and suggested setting up a call with Putin prior to a White House visit by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, according to a transcript of the Oct. 14 call published by Bloomberg News. Bloomberg said it had reviewed a recording of the call but did not say how it obtained access to it.
Ushakov said Wednesday that he talks to Witkoff regularly, but does not comment on the content of those conversations. “Someone is leaking, someone is listening, but not us,” he said when asked about the story.
In later comments, Ushakov said "some of these leaks are fake,” adding that his conversations with Witkoff were confidential and that leaking them to the media was “unacceptable.” He said he would discuss the leaks directly on a call with the U.S. envoy.
In an interview with Russia's Kommersant newspaper, Ushakov said he makes some calls via WhatsApp, which "someone, apparently, can somehow eavesdrop on."
Trump dismissed the controversy, describing Witkoff's reported approach on the call as “a very standard form of negotiation” and "what a dealmaker does."
White House communications director Steven Cheung also said on X that there was "nothing wrong" with what was said in the "supposed" transcript. "In fact, it shows what a successful negotiator does in order to get a deal done," Cheung said.
But the leak added fuel to criticism that Witkoff, and the original peace plan itself, were too favorable to the Kremlin.
“Outrageous on many levels. He [Witkoff] intentionally sabotaged the Trump-Zelenskyy meeting by pushing the Russians to call the day before. And he is hopelessly naive to think that Putin really wants to end the war,” said William Taylor, former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine.
Bloomberg also published a transcript of an Oct. 29 call between Ushakov and Kirill Dmitriev, a close Putin adviser who has emerged as a prominent figure in talks. “I’ll informally pass it along, making it clear that it’s all informal. And let them do like their own,” Dmitriev suggests. “I don’t think they’ll take exactly our version, but at least it’ll be as close to it as possible,” he said, according to the transcript.
Dmitriev posted “Fake” on X, adding that “the closer we get to peace the more desperate warmongers become.”
Ushakov did not deny the existence of the call with Dmitriev.
The original 28-point peace plan leaked last week appeared to favor Moscow heavily, forcing Ukraine to cede territory, including areas its army currently controls. It also envisioned a reduction to Ukraine’s military and a ban on Kyiv joining NATO.
The U.S. has insisted it authored the plan, after allies and lawmakers expressed concerns over its origins.
Talking to reporters aboard Air Force One late Tuesday, Trump said his plan was “a concept” and “an original proposal,” from which negotiators went “back and forth.”
Trump said his son-in-law Jared Kushner may join Witkoff in Moscow, having earlier announced that Army Secretary Dan Driscoll would meet with Ukrainian officials for further talks.
Asked whether Thanksgiving was no longer any sort of deadline, Trump responded: “You know what the deadline for me is? When it’s over. And I think everybody is tired of fighting at this point.”
Ushakov said Wednesday that Russia had received several versions of the peace plan, which he said can be “confusing.”
He said some aspects of it could be viewed “positively,” but added that the situation was “evolving rapidly.”
Asked whether Russia was closer to peace with Ukraine than ever before, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said, "It's premature to say so."
Kyiv appeared confident Tuesday that it could finalize a deal with Trump by the end of the month, saying it was looking forward to organizing a Trump-Zelenskyy meeting in the United States.
But Trump appeared to shoot that down, saying he would only meet with the two leaders once a deal was in its final stages.
