New Delhi: US Special Envoy Steve Witkoff Wednesday called Russian President Vladimir Putin a “humanitarian” after Moscow released American citizen Stephen Hubbard, who had been imprisoned in Russia since 2022.
The remark came during a meeting between Witkoff and Putin in St Petersburg, at a time of renewed efforts by the Trump administration to bring Moscow and Kyiv to the negotiating table. Hubbard, 74, is a retired school teacher from Michigan who had been living in Ukraine since 2014. Russian forces captured him in April 2022 in the Ukrainian city of Izyum.
“You talk so much about my president, President Trump, being a humanitarian. You are a humanitarian also, sir, and I salute that, I commend you, and I thank you again,” Witkoff told Putin, according to a Russian state media video clip posted on X. “Because of you he (Hubbard) is going home to his family,” he added.
After his capture, Hubbard was convicted by a Russian court over allegations that he signed up to fight for Ukraine in February 2022 and received training, weapons and payment for taking part, a Washington Post report said, citing Russian state media.
In 2024, Hubbard was sentenced to six years and 10 months in prison. Hubbard and US authorities have denied the mercenary allegation. The US State Department had designated him as wrongfully detained.
Steve Witkoff to Putin:
You talk so much about my president, President Trump, being a humanitarian.
You are a humanitarian also, sir, and I salute that, I commend you, and I thank you again. https://t.co/NRyw2YiMDD pic.twitter.com/Yuf07JkQ2I
— Anton Gerashchenko (@Gerashchenko_en) October 21, 2026
Trump said he had asked Putin to release Hubbard during a recent phone call. He said the US had not been required to give anything in return for the release.
Peace talks
In a Truth Social post Wednesday, Trump said that several people who had sought immediate sanctions imposed on Russia had “called to apologise” to him as they didn’t know that he was negotiating the release of Stephen Hubbard. “If sanctions would have been placed, certainly those negotiations would have come to a complete and total halt,” he wrote.
Witkoff’s visit to St Petersburg was part of Washington’s latest push to restart negotiations involving Russia, Ukraine and the US. The envoy had met Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and European leaders in Oslo before travelling to Russia. He said he wanted to discuss resuming trilateral talks and examine new proposals for ending the war.
The meeting marked Witkoff’s ninth in-person meeting with Putin.