OddsFrontKremlin aide urges Trump to end US support for Ukraine
Yuri Ushakov tied an end to American assistance to prospects for peace as Washington sought to restart trilateral negotiations without securing a breakthrough.
Moscow sets out a new demand
Kremlin foreign-policy aide Yuri Ushakov said the United States should stop supporting Ukraine if it wants to help end Russia's war. He delivered the demand to Russian state broadcaster VGTRK on September 9, one day after Presidents Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump spoke by telephone. The statement made continued American assistance a central point of dispute in Washington's renewed diplomatic effort.
The United States is no longer committing new direct military and financial aid on the earlier scale, but other Ukrainian partners can purchase American weapons through a NATO mechanism. Washington also continues intelligence cooperation with Kyiv. Ending those channels would materially weaken Ukraine's position, which is why Moscow's proposal is a negotiating demand rather than an agreed peace measure.
Talks without a breakthrough
Trump's envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner had recently visited Moscow and Kyiv in an attempt to restart negotiations. The Kyiv Independent reported that revised proposals were discussed but no breakthrough followed. The most concrete result was an understanding that Ukraine, Russia and the United States could resume trilateral talks, with Moscow favoring Abu Dhabi, where earlier rounds had taken place.
Ukraine's presidential office independently confirmed the September 7 Kyiv meeting with the American delegation. It said discussions covered restarting negotiations, the possible trilateral format and security guarantees. President Volodymyr Zelensky presented the resumption of talks as important but warned that Russia's conduct would determine whether diplomacy could move beyond process and produce an end to attacks.
Positions remain far apart
The underlying positions have not converged. Moscow continues to invoke the so-called root causes of the war and demands territorial concessions, including Ukrainian-held parts of the Donbas. Ukraine calls for a ceasefire along the current front and Western-backed guarantees capable of deterring another invasion. Ushakov's demand would reduce Kyiv's leverage before either of those central questions was settled.
What matters next is whether the three governments agree on a venue, agenda and date for renewed talks, and whether Washington treats continued assistance as leverage or as a concession. No ceasefire was agreed or took effect, and Ushakov announced no change in Russian military operations. The development therefore marks a sharper diplomatic condition, not an alert-eligible truce or newly begun strike.