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Welcome back to World Brief, where we’re looking at trilateral peace talks among Russia, Ukraine, and the United States in Abu Dhabi; a snap election in Japan; and continued violence following a disputed election in Uganda.

Officials from Russia, Ukraine, and the United States began talks in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, on Friday and are set to continue for two days, marking the first trilateral meeting of the three countries since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. The discussions follow a late-night meeting in Moscow on Thursday involving Russian President Vladimir Putin; two Russian aides; and three U.S. representatives, including special envoy Steve Witkoff and U.S. President Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner.

Welcome back to World Brief, where we’re looking at trilateral peace talks among Russia, Ukraine, and the United States in Abu Dhabi; a snap election in Japan; and continued violence following a disputed election in Uganda.

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Officials from Russia, Ukraine, and the United States began talks in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, on Friday and are set to continue for two days, marking the first trilateral meeting of the three countries since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. The discussions follow a late-night meeting in Moscow on Thursday involving Russian President Vladimir Putin; two Russian aides; and three U.S. representatives, including special envoy Steve Witkoff and U.S. President Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner.

Both meetings centered on territorial disputes, which Witkoff—speaking on Thursday at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, before he headed to Moscow—said is the “one issue” still preventing a deal. Russia is demanding that Ukraine relinquish the portion of the Donetsk region in eastern Ukraine that Kyiv still controls. Previous U.S. proposals have floated turning the Donbas—a region that includes Donetsk as well as the neighboring Luhansk oblast (province) of Ukraine—into a demilitarized free economic zone in exchange for security guarantees for Kyiv. Russia currently occupies nearly all of Luhansk and roughly two-thirds of........

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