Kirill Dmitriev is a rare breed of Russian diplomat.
At 50 he is relatively young and he has a deep understanding of the US, having studied and worked there for several years.
He is also a man of commerce, as head of the Russian Direct Investment Fund, and a good fit for his opposite number in the Trump administration, special envoy Steve Witkoff.
Dmitriev now finds himself under the spotlight over a draft peace plan that emerged after he spent three days with Witkoff in Miami.
His team has refused to comment on its proposals, which read like a Putin wishlist, requiring Ukraine to cede territory under its control and slash the size of its military.
Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky has been careful not to reject its terms, but says any deal must bring a dignified peace, with terms that respect our independence, our sovereignty.
Putin's special envoy understands modern Ukraine better than most in Moscow. He was brought up in Ukraine, and a friend claims that as a 15-year-old Dmitriev took part in pro-democracy protests in Kyiv before the fall of the Soviet Union.
He has been a fixture of US-Russian diplomatic initiatives pretty much since the start of Trump's second presidency - and Steve Witkoff has been a regular counterpart.
We are sure we are on the road to peace, and as peacemakers we need to make it happen, Dmitriev told a conference in Saudi Arabia in late October.
The pair appear to have first crossed paths in February 2025 when Putin's envoy played a role in securing the release of an American teacher from a Russian jail.
Days later, when US and Russian diplomats met in Saudi Arabia, in effect bringing an end to Russia's diplomatic isolation in the West, Dmitriev took part in talks on economic relations and Witkoff was there too.
Dmitriev's direct approach to Trump officials has not always paid off. When Trump announced sanctions on Russia's top two oil firms, US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent labelled him a Russian propagandist for suggesting it would mean higher US fuel prices at the pump.
Unlike the majority of Putin's entourage, the Russian leader's envoy is comfortable in a US TV studio. He is careful to praise Trump's diplomatic skills while giving Western viewers the Russian government narrative in their own language.
I'm not a military guy… but the position of [the] Russian military is they only hit military targets, he told CNN's Jake Tapper recently, days after a kindergarten was bombed in the Ukrainian city of Kharkiv. I'm just working to have dialogue and make sure that the conflict is ended as soon as possible.
Dmitriev has been a close aide of Putin, running the Russian Direct Investment Fund since 2011. Yet his relationships with various political figures reflect a complex perception of an envoy operating within the often contradictory landscapes of diplomacy and domestic politics.
His relationships, both in Russia and the broader international arena, continue to evolve as the Russia-Ukraine conflict presses on, leaving an uncertain legacy behind.
