Russian President Vladimir Putin met with President Donald Trump’s special envoy tasked with negotiating an end to Russia’s war in Ukraine, as well as his son-in-law, for a "constructive" five-hour meeting Tuesday, but more work needs to be done, Yuri Ushakov, a foreign policy adviser to Putin, said in a video the Kremlin posted online.

Axar.az informs, citing NBC news, Ushakov said in the Kremlin video that the meeting Tuesday was “very useful, constructive” but that the sides agreed not to get into details about the negotiations. “We specifically discussed territorial issues, without which we see no resolution to the crisis,” he said.

Witkoff presented the Russians with several documents. “There was a document containing 27 points. We naturally reviewed it. However, we didn’t work on the wording, and there were no discussions with our American colleagues about it,” Ushakov said, noting that the Americans gave the Russians four additional documents.

He added: “A compromise hasn’t been found yet, but some American proposals seem more or less acceptable, but they need to be discussed. Some of the language we’ve been offered is acceptable. The work will continue. It is indeed one of the most important questions.”

Ushakov said that contacts would continue “at the level of representatives, aides and other representatives, in particular with these two people who arrived in the Kremlin today,” but that no meeting between Trump and Putin was scheduled.

Asked by a journalist whether an end to the conflict was now closer than before, Ushakov replied: “No further, that’s for sure. But there’s still a lot of work to be done, both in Washington and Moscow. This has been agreed upon, and contacts will continue.”

The 'three pillars'

Putin has never hidden his hard-line demands.

He has sought the capture of all of Ukraine’s eastern industrial region of Donbas, comprising the contested Donetsk region and Russian-controlled Luhansk. (Russia holds about one-fifth of Ukraine’s territory.) He has also called for Ukraine to be “demilitarized,” essentially rendering it defenseless, and a final peace settlement to be acknowledged in international law.

“There are three pillars on which we will not compromise,” a Russian official briefed on the matter said on condition of anonymity. “One is the territory of the Donbas. The second is a limit on Ukraine’s armed forces. The third is the recognition of territory by America and Europe.”