DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Saudi Arabia’s crown prince wasn’t in the room for the first high-level talks between Russia and the United States over Moscow’s war on Ukraine on Tuesday, but Mohammed bin Salman still won the day for hosting the gathering that could be a game-changer in the bloody conflict.

After meeting with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Israel on the 16th, Minister Rubio continues his Middle East tour and will meet with the U.S. Special Envoy for the Middle East, Steve Whitcomb, and others on the 18th in Riyadh, the Saudi capital, to discuss ways to end the Ukraine war.

As Europeans talked the possibility of contributing peacekeepers to back any Ukraine peace deal, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov also said in Riyadh that Moscow would not accept the deployment of NATO troops there,