Abu Dhabi Talks Open With Kushner Saying U.S. Has 'Ideas to Bridge' Gaps, Europeans Meeting Separately

Hours after the Abu Dhabi talks on ending the war in Ukraine opened on Tuesday, Nov. 10, the U.S. mediators are claiming progress in identifying where the sides still differ, while the fighting continues.

Russian state media, including the RIA news agency, announced the start of the session at 0800 GMT. It runs Tuesday and Wednesday.

What Kushner said

U.S. envoy Jared Kushner, President Trump's son-in-law, addressed the delegations at the start. "We've had almost daily conversations with both sides and we've identified now where the gaps still fall short. We have some ideas to bridge them," he said.

Kushner said Trump is asking his team for extra effort because he "thinks this war has gone on too long" and is disturbed by the death toll. He said the aim is also a new security framework linking Ukraine, Russia and Europe. "Hopefully this becomes the last war that we have here," he said.

Kushner and envoy Steve Witkoff face Ukraine's delegation, led by foreign intelligence chief Rustem Umerov. Russia's delegation is led by Kremlin aide Vladimir Medinsky, who said it "has become bigger and more professional." According to Russian state news agency TASS, it also includes deputy foreign ministers Sergei Ryabkov and Mikhail Galuzin, military intelligence chief Igor Kostyukov and General Staff member Yuri Zhigarlovsky.

Umerov said Kyiv has a mandate from President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to discuss all issues and wants lasting peace and security guarantees. UAE Foreign Minister Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed Al Nahyan joined the opening to greet participants.

The guarantee question

On a background call Monday, a U.S. official said the administration has asked Russia to accept an "Article Four and an Article Five-like security guarantee" for Ukraine, "effectively very similar to NATO." Those NATO articles cover consultations and collective defense.

The same official said Trump has not decided what guarantee the United States itself would give. He called that a "really, really big deal" for Trump and Zelenskyy to settle.

The framework under discussion includes security consultations, crisis hotlines and "reciprocal de-escalation measures." The officials also floated reactivating the NATO-Russia Council, largely paused since 2022.

The official argued the territory fight cannot be settled first. "They will not solve the Donetsk issue and the territorial issue until they know what the security architecture is going to be after the war," he said.

Publicly, nothing has moved. Moscow demands the part of Donetsk Ukraine still holds, and Kyiv wants the contact line frozen. The official said both sides have shown "a little bit of flexibility, privately." U.S. negotiators do not expect to resolve territory in Abu Dhabi.

Trump said in a "60 Minutes" interview that aired Sunday that Ukraine could emerge from the war with "a little bit different shape."

Europe's place in the room

Representatives of the UK, France, Germany and Italy, plus NATO and the European Commission, met the Ukrainian and U.S. teams before the trilateral session. Umerov thanked EU officials for helping prepare the talks over almost a year.

Whether Europeans sit in the main meeting is contested. French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot said France, the UK and Germany "will indeed be in the meeting room." Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Monday that Europe has its own channels to Kyiv and Washington, and that this is "a trilateral negotiation," with the U.S. as mediator. Euronews reports the European officials will hold separate discussions and not take part in the trilateral meeting.

The Elysée Palace said Paris is working with Ukraine to assert that "the pursuit of peace in Ukraine and security in Europe are inextricably linked."

European skepticism of Moscow is open. EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said Monday she saw little sign Russia would negotiate in good faith. Former NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen told Euronews that Europe "is begging for a place at the table" and must make itself "indispensable by bringing assets." He said Trump "chose Moscow," a claim the U.S. officials quoted above did not address.

Rasmussen also pointed to Europe's split voices. A 90-minute call with Vladimir Putin, initiated by Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre and Finnish President Alexander Stubb, drew a rebuke from Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen. "It was not coordinated with any of us," she said.

The war did not pause

Ukraine's air force said Russia launched 162 drones and a ballistic missile at Ukraine overnight. Russia's Defense Ministry said its forces shot down 155 Ukrainian drones over eight Russian regions and Crimea. The two armies are largely deadlocked on the front line.

The last trilateral round, in Geneva in February, produced no breakthrough. Diplomacy then stalled after the U.S.-Israel war on Iran pulled Washington's attention away, though Witkoff and Kushner have since met Putin and Zelenskyy separately.

The session continues Wednesday, Nov. 11. Whether Trump settles on a U.S. guarantee remains unclear, since the U.S. official said territory cannot be settled without the security terms.