US envoy visits Moscow for ceasefire talks that Russia says would help Ukraine

Russian President Vladimir Putin visited his commanders in the Kursk region on Wednesday (Russian Presidential Press Service via AP)

An envoy of US President Donald Trump has arrived in Moscow for talks on an American-proposed 30-day ceasefire that Ukraine has accepted but which a senior Russian official said would help Kyiv by giving its weary and shorthanded military a break.

The diplomatic development coincided with a Russian claim that its troops had driven the Ukrainian army out of a key town in Russia’s Kursk border region, where Moscow has been trying for seven months to dislodge Ukrainian troops from their foothold.