Moscow, Russia - Russia on Monday indicated it is open to resuming talks with the US and Ukraine after Washington's chief negotiators, Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, visited both Moscow and Kyiv.
US-led diplomatic efforts to end Europe's deadliest conflict since World War II have stalled in recent months, as Washington has shifted its focus towards the war with Iran.
Russian and Ukrainian negotiators last met for US-mediated talks in February, in Geneva, but failed to reach an agreement on the thorny issue of territory. Talks had not resumed since, until Kushner and Witkoff's recent visit to both countries.
Russia "does not rule out the resumption of the trilateral format, but it is too early to say anything about the venue or the exact dates at this stage," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters on Monday.
Witkoff and Kushner met with Russia's Vladimir Putin and Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky over the weekend in a renewed push to end the fighting.
A senior Ukrainian presidential source told AFP the pair had brought "more effective" proposals on ending the war, although neither Moscow and Kyiv announced a breakthrough.
According to Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov, the talks with Putin were "extremely frank" and the US envoys "put forward a number of ideas on possible routes to a settlement."
The four-and-a-half year conflict has left tens of thousands of soldiers and civilians dead, and has now raged on for longer than the entirety of World War I.
Talks remain deadlocked over the issue of Ukraine's eastern Donbas region, which Russia does not fully control but has demanded in full as part of any peace settlement.