Putin entrusted talks with the U.S. to two conflicting teams of negotiators

Kirill Dmitriev, the head of the Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF), who has ties to the president’s family, met with Donald Trump’s special envoy Steve Whitkoff in Washington on Wednesday. This trip looks like a breakthrough, as it is the first official visit by a Russian official to the US since the start of the war. However, the Russian Foreign Ministry has not said a word about it all day, and Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov merely commented, «We continue our communication through various channels.» The Kremlin and the Foreign Ministry’s reticence may be explained by the fact that Vladimir Putin gave the go-ahead to negotiate with Washington to essentially two separate teams that do not get along well with each other and even clashed over a seat at the table during the February 18 round in Riyadh, according to Agentstvo source with knowledge of the talks.

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Details. American TV channels were the first to learn about Dmitriev’s mission in Washington — CNN became the main source of information, CBS and The Washington Post later confirmed it. According to CNN, the purpose of the meeting is to negotiate the strengthening of relations between Russia and the US and the settlement of the war in Ukraine. In order for Dmitriev to enter the US, American authorities suspended sanctions against him, CNN’s source claimed. On Thursday night, Reuters, citing two sources, said the meeting between Dmitriev and Whitkoff had taken place, but its details were unknown.

• ️ The Western media have been the main source of reports that Dmitriev is playing a crucial role in the talks with Washington. Dmitriev «could play a key role as an unofficial conduit to Trump’s negotiators,» Bloomberg wrote days before the meeting in Riyadh. The agency also called Dmitriev the author of Russia’s negotiating strategy with the US.

• ️ Despite such high status, Dmitriev was not present at the negotiating table during the February 18 meeting, according to footage from Riyadh. The delegation was officially led by Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and presidential aide Yuri Ushakov. Footage of the Russian delegation entering the talks shows Dmitriev, but Ushakov appears to be pushing the Saudi official who is greeting the Russians away from the head of RDIF, who is standing nearby.

• ️ Before the talks in Riyadh, Putin told Lavrov that the Russian delegation would consist of two people — the foreign minister himself and Ushakov, Agentstvo source says. However, according to the source, Dmitriev met with Putin afterward and asked him to participate in the talks as well. According to him, Putin agreed, but did not tell Lavrov about it.

• ️ Lavrov was greatly surprised to see three chairs for the Russian side in the negotiating room, the source assures. According to him, when it was explained to the minister that the third seat was for Dmitriev, he pushed the chair away from the table with the words, «If he wants to participate, let Vladimir Vladimirovich tell me about it.» Dmitriev then left the hall for the corridor to talk to journalists, Agentstvo source says.

• ️ The source says Dmitriev still managed to sit down at the negotiating table. During one of the technical breaks, Lavrov left the hall, and when he returned, he saw Dmitriev already at the table. «The Americans were also coming back and it would be too awkward for [Lavrov] to make a scene. Dmitriev said: ‘I need to sit down for at least 15 minutes,’» the source recounts.
• ️ Agentstvo could not independently confirm part of the source’s statement. Footage from Riyadh shows three people sitting on the American side of the table — Whitkoff, Secretary of State Mark Rubio and Trump’s national security adviser Mike Waltz — and Lavrov and Ushakov on the Russian side. There is no third chair next to the Kremlin representatives on the footage from the negotiating room. Agentstvo also failed to find footage of Dmitriev sitting at the negotiating table. Before, during and after the negotiations Dmitriev did give comments to the press, as the analysis of media reports shows. The press service of RDIF also published a photo from behind the scenes of the meeting, where Dmitriev is talking to Rubio, Waltz and Whitkoff (without Lavrov and Ushakov).

• ️ Agentsvo’s source believes that the peculiarities of Putin’s communication with officials are affecting the negotiations. «Everyone goes to Putin one by one, and he tells everyone different things. This is also why no one can formulate Russia’s demands at the talks,» the source believes.

Context. The talks between Russia and the US are accompanied by serious discrepancies in the versions of the Kremlin and the White House. Following a telephone conversation between Trump and Putin in March, the US presidential administration said that «movement toward peace will begin with the cessation of strikes on power plants and infrastructure.» A Kremlin press release said Putin supported Trump’s idea of a mutual waiver between Russia and Ukraine to stop strikes on just the energy infrastructure for 30 days.

• ️ After the second meeting in Riyadh on March 24, CBS reported that Moscow and Washington would release a joint statement. However, a few hours later, Peskov said that the results of the meeting «‘will not be published’ for sure» because they were «technical» in nature. A few hours later, the White House released a statement saying that the meeting had resulted in an agreement on a partial ceasefire in the Black Sea. After that, the Kremlin released its version of the agreed terms. It implied that an agreement on the Black Sea would only be achieved after the easing of sanctions begins. In particular, Rosselkhozbank was to be reconnected to the SWIFT system.

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