In public: "substantive and constructive talks". In private, if MP Anna Skorokhod of the Verkhovna Rada is to be believed, the American envoys came to Kyiv with tougher conditions than at any point so far - including demands relating to the Constitution and to territory.

The 6 September visit to Kyiv by Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner produced no concrete agreement on ending the war, even though every participant publicly described it as successful. Skorokhod claims that behind closed doors the conversation was far harder. Speaking to a Ukrainian journalist, she said there was "no breakthrough" and that, according to her information, the envoys arrived with "even worse conditions" than before.

"Previously there was no demand to change the Constitution or recognise territories, and now they are asking for it," she said, adding that there are several further points not yet made public.

What is confirmed, and what remains a claim

The two need separating clearly. Skorokhod is an MP, not a participant in the talks - she is relaying information, not testifying. What has been officially confirmed is more measured: after the meeting Zelensky said the territorial question remained open and that questions this complex can only be resolved at presidential level. They also discussed security guarantees, military support, economic guarantees and post-war reconstruction.

Witkoff, for his part, said the envoys brought "new ideas" to Kyiv that they had previously discussed with Putin in Moscow, and expressed hope that a trilateral negotiating format could soon be revived. But neither after Moscow nor after Kyiv has any concrete peace agreement been announced.

The Constitution is a new line

If the claim about the Constitution is accurate, that is a qualitatively new kind of pressure. Territory has been the subject of war and of every peace agreement in history; a state's constitutional order has not. Demanding that someone change their constitution as a condition for peace means asking not only for land but for internal arrangements - and that is a distinction no negotiator draws by accident.

The biggest obstacle remains territory. Russia demands the withdrawal of Ukrainian forces from the parts of the Donbas Kyiv still controls; Ukraine rejects that demand. After the meeting Zelensky repeated that the territorial question exists, but did not publicly accept the stated formulation about a unilateral withdrawal, and the Ukrainian side insists on firm security guarantees as a condition for any future agreement.

The Balkans recognise this phase: the talks are described as constructive, nobody signs anything, and the conditions quietly shift from meeting to meeting. The question is not whether there will be an agreement - the question is who gets to define the word "peace" before anyone reaches it.