American and Russian officials held more than 12 hours of talks in Saudi Arabia as part of US President Donald Trump's effort to end the war in Ukraine, where Moscow's full-scale invasion is in its fourth year.
The US-Russia meeting, which broke up late in the evening on March 24, came one day after separate talks between the US and Ukraine -- also in Saudi Arabia -- which Kyiv called "productive."
Little news emerged from the talks, which were expected to address details of a potential pause in long-range attacks by both Russia and Ukraine against energy facilities and civilian infrastructure as well as a halt on attacks in the Black Sea.
Russian state news agency TASS cited an unnamed source in the Russian delegation as saying the Kremlin and the White House would release a joint statement on March 25. There was no immediate word from US officials following the talks.
Russian and Ukrainian diplomats did not meet directly, and the fighting continued. A Russian air attack on March 24 damaged a school and a hospital in the northeastern Ukrainian city of Sumy, wounding nearly 90 people including 17 children, according to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
A Russian occupation official in Ukraine's Luhansk region said later on March 24 that Ukrainian shelling had killed six people there including a correspondent for the Russian newspaper Izvestia and a camera operator and driver.
The US team at the talks was reportedly being led by Andrew Peek, a senior director at the White House National Security Council, and Michael Anton, a senior State Department official.
Russia was represented by Grigory Karasin, a longtime former deputy foreign minister who heads the Foreign Affairs Committee in Russia's upper parliament chamber, and Sergei Beseda, adviser to the director of the Federal Security Service, according to Russian state media.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said the negotiations between Moscow and Washington were focused on technical issues, including the security of commercial shipping in the Black Sea region.
In Washington, Trump told reporters broadly that the talks in Saudi Arabia were touching on issues including territory in Ukraine, where Russia occupies about one-fifth of the country, and about the possibility of the United States controlling the Zaporizhzhya nuclear power plant, which is Europe's largest and has been held by Russia since early in the full-scale invasion.
"We're talking about territory right now. We're talking about lines of demarcation. Talking about a power plant ownership. Some people are saying the United States should own the power plant...because we have the expertise," Trump said.
He also said the United States and Ukraine would "soon" sign an agreement on joint development of Ukraine's rare-earth minerals and other resources.
SEE ALSO: Sober Expectations In Russia And Ukraine Ahead Of Saudi Talks'Constructive And Meaningful Talks'
US officials said little about the talks with Ukraine on March 23, but Ukrainian Defense Minister Rustem Umerov said the session had been "constructive and meaningful."
“The discussion was productive and focused -- we addressed key points including energy," Umerov said in a Facebook post. He said that Zelenskyy’s goal "is to secure a just and lasting peace for our country and our people -- and, by extension, for all of Europe. We are working to make that goal a reality.”
The talks in Saudi Arabia marked a milestone in US-led efforts to bring about a cease-fire in the Ukraine war. Previously, there have been breaks of a day or more between different rounds of bilateral talks. Having everyone in the same place could speed things up.
But despite the proximity of the talks in time and place, there were few expectations of a major breakthrough.
SEE ALSO: Deadly Russian Strikes Hit Kyiv, Causing Fires, While Other Regions Also BurnZelenskyy said on March 23 that the "conversation is quite useful.... But no matter what we say to our partners today, we need to get [Russian President Vladimir] Putin to give a real order to stop the strikes."
US officials had voiced optimism ahead of the Saudi meetings.
"I think that you're going to see in Saudi Arabia on Monday some real progress,” US envoy Steve Witkoff told Fox News on March 22.
The view from Kyiv and Moscow was been more sober.
"The maximum result is a pause. But this is still unknown, because the negotiations could drag on for a month or two,” political analyst Serhiy Taran told RFE/RL’s Ukrainian Service.
“I think the most that can be imagined is that, perhaps, some technical details about the cease-fire will be worked out. And they will then be taken back to Kyiv, Moscow, and Washington in the form of proposals,” he said.
Ukrainian lawmaker Oleksandr Merezhko expressed doubt that Putin would actually observe the conditions of any potential cease-fire.
"He follows his usual model," he told RFE/RL.
"He says one thing and does something completely different. One telling example was he'd allegedly ordered an end to strikes on energy infrastructure and an hour later he started an intensive bombing of Ukrainian civil facilities."
"Unfortunately, the United States may still be under the illusion that you can make an agreement with Putin," he added. "They may need more time to realize he doesn't respect agreements."
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Analysts Skeptical Over Cease-Fire Talks As Russia Targets Kharkiv Region
In Russia, where RFE/RL has been declared an undesirable organization and is effectively banned, it was Peskov who doused cold water on any hopes of a quick deal.
"One shouldn't get one's hopes high. Very serious, thorough work is ahead. We will have to delve into the details," he said in an interview on state TV on March 23.
“We're only [at] the beginning of this road," he added.
Kyiv has accused Moscow of playing for time and feigning interest in ending the war, and many analysts say Russia wants to drag out any peace process in the hopes of gaining as many concessions as it can.
Russian political scientist Ivan Preobrazhensky was skeptical of the prospects for peace anytime soon.
"This attempt to reach a cease-fire agreement [lacks any proper framework] and is hanging by a thread." he told Current Time. "It looks weaker, not stronger. The negotiations aren't getting more straightforward with the sides trying to overcome obstacles and reach common ground. On the contrary, they're becoming more complicated, which reduces the chances of a deal."
Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andriy Sybiha wrote on X on March 24 that the March 24 attack on Sumy, in which several high-rise residential blocks in the city center were also damaged, showed Moscow's talk of peace ring "hollow."
"Moscow speaks of peace while carrying out brutal strikes on densely populated residential areas in major Ukrainian cities," he wrote.
SEE ALSO: US Boots On The Ground In Ukraine? Trump's Nuclear Power Proposal Turns HeadsA plan agreed with Ukraine on March 11 for a 30-day general cease-fire was stonewalled by Putin. After a phone call with Putin on March 18, Trump said they had agreed to a pause on attacks on infrastructure.
But the Kremlin narrowed the focus further, saying that the deal only concerned energy infrastructure -- which its forces subsequently attacked anyway. Ukraine hoped to clear this up in Saudi Arabia by bringing a list of what Russia must agree not to target.
There was similar confusion after Trump’s talks with Zelenskyy. While US officials were speaking of a new plan for US ownership of Ukrainian nuclear plants, as a form of security guarantee for Ukraine, Zelenskyy made it clear these plants were state property that belonged to all Ukrainians.
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'I Didn't Want To Leave My Home': Residents Flee Sumy Amid Fresh Attacks
Meanwhile, the Black Sea was a focus of the talks in Saudi Arabia.
Witkoff, the US envoy, said there would be progress on “a Black Sea cease-fire, on ships between both countries. And from that, you'll naturally gravitate into a full-on shooting cease-fire."
Witkoff also said he was confident that Putin wanted peace, something that Ukraine and European countries do not believe.
As the faltering diplomatic process has edged forward, both Ukraine and Russia reported shooting down a barrage of drones from the opposition side on March 24.
Kyiv said that Russia launched 99 drones at Ukraine overnight, of which 57 were shot down by Ukraine’s air defense systems and 36 were lost from radar.
The remaining drones caused damage in at least five regions of Ukraine, authorities said. At least four people were wounded as the drones struck residential buildings in Kyiv, Kharkiv, and Zaporizhzhya regions, local authorities said.
Russia’s Foreign Ministry said on March 24 that Russia downed 227 Ukrainian drones overnight.