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Senior American and Russian officials were set to meet in Saudi Arabia on Tuesday for the most extensive negotiations between the two countries in at least three years, as President Trump pushes to end the war in Ukraine and the Kremlin seeks warmer ties with Washington.<\/p>\n
After arriving in Riyadh, the Saudi capital, Russian officials said they would seek \u201cnormalization\u201d with the United States, even holding out the possibility that major American oil companies could return to Russia. Ukraine and Europe were watching from a distance with deep apprehension, amid fears that Mr. Trump could try to force a peace deal on Ukraine that would be favorable to Russia.<\/p>\n
The meeting comes less than a week after Mr. Trump\u2019s lengthy phone call with President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia. Mr. Trump said afterward that the two leaders spoke of \u201cthe great benefit\u201d that the United States and Russia \u201cwill someday have in working together,\u201d and that the two leaders had agreed to \u201cstart negotiations immediately\u201d to end the war in Ukraine.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
The U.S. delegation in Riyadh is led by Marco Rubio, the secretary of state; Michael Waltz, the national security adviser; and Steve Witkoff, Mr. Trump\u2019s Middle East envoy and a longtime friend of the president. They were expected to meet Tuesday with Russian officials including Sergey V. Lavrov, the foreign minister; Yuri Ushakov, Mr. Putin\u2019s foreign policy adviser; and Kirill Dmitriev, the head of Russia\u2019s sovereign wealth fund.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
Mr. Ushakov told reporters after landing in Riyadh that the goal of the talks would be \u201cto start a real normalization of the relationship between us and Washington.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mr. Dmitriev, who worked with Mr. Witkoff to broker the release last week of an American schoolteacher<\/a> jailed in Russia, said he would seek to restart economic cooperation with the United States in order to \u201crebuild communication, rebuild trust, rebuild success.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cU.S. oil majors have had very successful business in Russia,\u201d Mr. Dmitriev said in a brief interview on Tuesday before the talks began, offering an example of how the countries could rebuild business ties. \u201cWe believe at some point they will be coming back, because why would they forego these opportunities that Russia gave them to have access to Russian natural resources?\u201d<\/p>\n