Kirill Dmitriev, head of Russia's state investment fund (RDIF), is widely seen as one of the architects behind Donald Trump's 28-point plan for a peace in Ukraine. A Stanford graduate, he not only boasts a close relationship with Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner, but also with influential power brokers across the Arab world. Together with his business experience and ties to the family of Russian President Vladimir Putin, this resume has made him an ideal choice for the role of Russia's unofficial alternative negotiator.

One of the channels for Russian diplomacy

His importance to the Kremlin since the start of Donald Trump's second term as US president in January 2025, when Kirill Dmitriev emerged as one of Russia's main negotiators on Ukraine peace talksand broader Russian-American relations.

In February 2025, Putin appointed him presidential special envoy for investment and economic cooperation with foreign countries. This came just days after the first meeting between Russian and US representatives in Riyadh, in which Dmitriev took part.

Today, Dmitriev serves as one of the Kremlin's key channels for diplomacy, according to former Russian diplomat Boris Bondarev. While Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov deals with US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Dmitriev has been put in charge of contacts with US special envoy Steve Witkoff.

"Dmitriev is the channel to Witkoff," Bondarev says. "He's a vulnerable — actually, very weak — link in the Trump administration. They're all relatively weak, but this one is the weakest. That's why Dmitriev has been assigned to work with him, trying to advance Russia's approach via this particularly weak point."

How Dmitriev's career began

Kirill Dmitriev, son of well-known biologist Alexander Dmitriev, was born in Kyiv. Yet he seems reluctant to acknowledge his roots: in a 2021 interview with an independent Russian outlet The Bell, the future negotiator insisted he wasn't born in Ukraine, but in the Soviet Union.

After graduating from Stanford University, he stayed briefly in the United States, where — according to his official biography on the RDIF website — he began his career at the investment bank Goldman Sachs and the consultancy McKinsey. Eventually, he chose to build his career in Russia and Ukraine.

In Russia, one of his key posts was at the Russian-American firm Delta Private Equity Partners, which managed roughly $500 million. In Ukraine, Dmitriev took charge of a fund belonging to the son-in-law of Ukraine's second president, Leonid Kuchma.

Dmitriev stepped into his current role as head of the Russian Direct Investment Fund in 2011. The organization was designed to draw Western capital into the country. It was in this capacity that he landed on US and European sanctions lists at the very start of the war in Ukraine.

A family link to Vladimir Putin?

But it wasn't only his professional achievements that pushed Dmitriev to the front line of international affairs. His real asset has been his social capital: the network he has carefully cultivated over many years.

Ilya Shumanov, former head of the anti-corruption NGO Transparency International Russia, told DW that Dmitriev's connection to the son-in-law of Ukraine's second president might have opened doors to Russia's political and business elite.

"The key piece in this mosaic of connections was Ekaterina Tikhonova — Vladimir Putin's alleged daughter, with whom Dmitriev's wife is close," Shumanov says.

According to him, the relationship between the Dmitrievs and Tikhonova goes beyond friendship, the families are closely intertwined.

Dmitriev sat on the boards of several major Russian companies, including those with significant state ownership.

When Putin noticed Dmitriev

Kirill Dmitriev's work as a go-between began during Donald Trump's first term. In 2020, The Daily Beast described him as 'Putin's money man' having a clandestine connection to Jared Kushner.

Jared Kushner, Trump's son-in-law who is married to Ivanka Trump, handled the president's foreign-policy assignments. While not being as public a part of the Trump administration the second time around, Kushner recently was involved in the creation of Trump's Gaza peace plan and attended the Ukraine peace talks in Geneva.

During Trump's first term, Dmitriev and Kushner were discussing potential avenues for American investment in Russia — talks that ultimately never produced major projects.

But Dmitriev truly made his mark and became one of the most valuable figures in Russian foreign policy almost two years after the full-scale war in Ukraine began, in December 2023, according to political analyst and former Putin speechwriter Abbas Gallyamov.

"After the war started, Putin could hardly travel anywhere [because of the ICC arrest warrant]," Gallyamov reminds. "This sense of isolation worried him deeply and worried Russia as a whole. And that's when Kirill Dmitriev stepped in as the main organizer of this trip [to Saudi Arabia and the UAE]."

Beyond arranging the trip itself, Dmitriev and his sovereign investment fund managed to attract investments from these countries — an impressive feat amid the flight of Western capital.

"In other words, he proved extremely effective on the international stage," Gallyamov says.

Dmitriev vs. Lavrov

Gallyamov sees Dmitriev as someone oriented toward resolving disagreements between the US and Russia through compromise – by contrast with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, a staunch advocate of a hardline approach.

"When Putin feels that real negotiations are necessary, Dmitriev steps forward," Gallyamov notes. "But in many situations, Putin doesn't want to negotiate. Lavrov reflects that internal mindset."

Gallyamov points out that during US special envoy Steve Witkoff's most recent visit to Moscow, Putin met him together with Dmitriev and his aide Yuri Ushakov — while Lavrov was absent.

But it's unclear whether this situational choice signals the future direction of Russian diplomacy.

Edited by: Carla Bleiker