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Ratcliffe’s Moscow trip
CIA Director John Ratcliffe traveled to Moscow on Tuesday for meetings with Russian intelligence services, with U.S. media outlets citing unnamed sources and the Kremlin saying no meeting with President Vladimir Putin was planned.
““No, there are no such plans,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters”
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters during a press briefing on Tuesday, “No, there are no such plans,” when asked about reports of talks with US envoys this week.
The visit was reported after a U.S. military transport aircraft traveled from Riga to Moscow, with Flightradar24 data showing a U.S. military C-17 departing Riga airport at 05:50 GMT and landing at nearly 07:04 GMT.
CBS News said Ratcliffe held talks with Russian intelligence officials during his visit, while Peskov told reporters in Moscow on Wednesday that Ratcliffe did not meet President Vladimir Putin.
The trip came as US-brokered talks aimed at ending Russia’s invasion of Ukraine have stalled, and the Kremlin said Russia-Ukraine peace negotiations remain stalled.
Kremlin frames contacts
While the Kremlin confirmed the intelligence-service contacts, it repeatedly drew a line between meetings with Putin and meetings with Russia’s intelligence services.
BBC reported Peskov said, “There were contacts with the intelligence services,” and added, “There were no meetings with the president of Russia.”
Peskov also told reporters that contacts between intelligence agencies are “a positive phenomenon, a positive process,” and said they often continue “even during the most difficult moments” in relations between the two countries.
CNN reported that Peskov said Ratcliffe’s contact with Russia was “more or less at the level of the special services,” and described it as “positive,” while saying it was premature to speculate about any effect on the “deep crisis.”
Ahead of the trip, the U.S. asked Ukraine to halt drone and missile strikes in Moscow and other cities in the north of Russia for Monday through Wednesday, according to CNN and a person familiar with the matter.
What’s at stake next
The sources tie Ratcliffe’s unannounced visit to a wider diplomatic deadlock over ending the war in Ukraine and to ongoing U.S.-Russia tensions described as a “deep crisis.”
“what he called a "deep crisis" more than four and a half years into Russia's war on Ukraine”
CBS News said it was too soon to predict whether the intelligence officials’ meeting might help get bilateral U.S.-Russian relations out of what Peskov called a “deep crisis” more than four and a half years into Russia’s war on Ukraine.
CBS News also said the CIA has played a role in recent U.S.-Russia detainee exchanges, including the April 2025 release of a U.S.-Russian dual national Ksenia Karelina, whose case Ratcliffe personally negotiated.
Al Jazeera reported that Ratcliffe has been reportedly central to high-profile prisoner exchanges between the US and Russia since Donald Trump took office in January 2025, including the release of Ksenia Karelina.
The visit also intersected with the U.S.-Iran issue, with Al Jazeera saying the Iran war is a live issue between Washington and Tehran’s ally, Moscow, and with CNN reporting that Ratcliffe’s trip came one day after Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent announced “Operation Economic Outcast.”