Zelensky Abruptly Cancels Planned Saudi Visit After Being Sidelined From US-Russia Talks

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky announced Tuesday he is cancelling his scheduled state visit to Saudi Arabia following the conclusion of US-Russia talks there.

He’s been on a Middle East diplomatic tour to gain support for his country now three years in to the Russia-Ukraine war, which took him to the UAE, Turkey, and Wednesday he was supposed to be in Saudi Arabia to meet with the kingdom’s leadership. The Saudi trip had been planned before it was known that the US-Russia talks would take place.

“Zelensky CANCELLING trip to Saudi Arabia following US/Russia talks. Zelensky will now return to Kyiv from Ankara, Turkey,” Fox News has reported. He now says he plans to visit in March. Zelensky is clearly trying to lash out at Washington.

Without doubt this is to signal his anger about being cut out of talks toward ending the Ukraine war. The Kremlin hailed Tuesday’s four-and-half hour meeting in Riyadh, with Rubio leading the US side and Lavrov leading the Moscow delegation, as “successful”. European officials were also noticeably absent from the meeting, which was hosted and mediated by the Saudi government.

Zelensky had issued a prior warning while in the UAE: “Ukraine will not accept. Ukraine knew nothing about this. And Ukraine regards any negotiations about Ukraine without Ukraine as having no results,” he had said.

“Ukraine will not take part in the negotiations. Ukraine did not know they were planned. And the visit to the region was planned long before the US decided to meet Russia there,” he continued.

The fact that a high-level peace meeting was taking place without Zelensky or any Ukrainian representation, at the very moment he was in the region, is being felt as adding insult to injury from the Trump administration.

Top Russian diplomat Sergey Lavrov has explained the need for Zelensky’s absence from talks as follows: “I don’t know what they [Kiev officals] could do at the negotiating table. If their aim is to cunningly extract a deceptive truce while secretly preparing for continued war—true to their habits and nature—then why invite them at all?” according to TASS.

The US and Russian sides have vowed to continue the peace negotiations going, hopefully leading to a face-to-face meeting between Presidents Putin and Trump.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio after the Riyadh meeting issued a statement revealing an agreement for election to be held in Ukraine, which Zelensky certainly isn’t going to like (and probably won’t agree to), given also he just recently argued that martial law prevents this. 

Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov:

Zelensky’s entire team needs to be brought to reason, and he himself needs to be slapped on the wrist.

Russia has never endangered Ukraine’s energy supply system. pic.twitter.com/Kl8RHgjgGW

— Clash Report (@clashreport) February 18, 2025

But Putin has said negotiations with Ukraine remain a non-starter so long as Zelensky refuses to hold elections. The Russian leader has said this makes him ‘illegitimate’ and thus he can’t legally sign any peace terms.