Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky talks to the press as diplomats stands behind him near a destroyed residential building following a Russian missile attack in Kyiv on April 25, 2025, amid the Russian invasion of Ukraine. (Photo by Tetiana DZHAFAROVA / AFP)
Kyiv, Ukraine: President Volodymyr Zelensky on Friday rejected suggestions Ukraine give up Crimea to Russia, as US President Donald Trump's envoy met Russian leader Vladimir Putin in Moscow, where the Kremlin said they discussed the "possibility" of direct ceasefire talks.
The three-hour meeting went ahead just after a Russian general was killed in a Moscow car bomb attack that Russia blamed on Ukraine. Ukraine is in turn outraged by a Russian strike on Kyiv that left 12 dead.
With Ukraine fearful Trump could force it to cede Crimea -- a strategic Black Sea peninsula seized by Russia in 2014 -- Zelensky insisted the territory is "the property of the Ukrainian people".
"Our position is unchanged," he told reporters in Kyiv. "The constitution of Ukraine says that all the temporarily occupied territories... belong to Ukraine."
Zelensky cited the Kyiv strike as one of the reasons he might miss Pope Francis's funeral Saturday, where he could potentially have met Trump for the first time since their explosive White House confrontation in February.
Trump is pushing for a ceasefire in the more than three-year conflict, but Putin has resisted.
Just before Witkoff met Putin, Russia reported that General Yaroslav Moskalik, one of the deputy heads of the general staff, was killed by a bomb in a parked car just outside Moscow.
"There are reasons to believe that Ukraine's special services were involved in the murder," Russia's foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said in a statement. Ukraine did not immediately comment.
Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov said Witkoff and Putin had held a "constructive" conversation, including "a discussion on the possibility of renewing direct negotiations between representatives of the Russian Federation and Ukraine".
Russia and Ukraine have not held direct talks on the conflict since it started in February 2022. The war has devastated swathes of eastern Ukraine and killed tens of thousands of people.
