Trump to press Putin to end 'bloodbath' in Ukraine
"HOPEFULLY IT WILL BE A PRODUCTIVE DAY, A CEASEFIRE WILL TAKE PLACE, AND THIS VERY VIOLENT WAR, A WAR THAT SHOULD HAVE NEVER HAPPENED, WILL END," Trump wrote on his Truth social media platform Saturday in his customary all-capitalized comments.
The subject of the call will be trade and stopping the "bloodbath" of Russian and Ukrainian deaths, he said.
His call with Putin will take place at 5 p.m. Moscow time (10:00 a.m. E.T.) and will take into account the outcome of negotiations carried out last week in Istanbul, Kremlin Spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said Monday, according to Google-translated comments carried by Russian state news agency Tass.
The U.S. mediation is set to happen after representatives from Russia and Ukraine held their first face-to-face talks since 2022 in Istanbul last week, as part of downgraded discussions that had originally been hoped to bring together Moscow and Kyiv's heads of state. Putin and Trump ultimately spurned the meeting, which culminated in an agreement to exchange prisoners of war, but failed to progress the peace process.
Talks to end the three-year war in Ukraine have languished in recent months, despite a U.S. drive to materialize Trump's pledge to achieve peace urgently. Threats from Trump that Washington could withdraw from the diplomatic process in the absence of an imminent resolution have raised concerns that the White House might diminish its critical military and humanitarian support for Ukraine.
Trump, whose revived dormant relations with the Kremlin after years of frigidity under his predecessor Joe Biden's administration, has recently turned tack on his reluctance to directly criticize Putin, increasingly levying the possibility of further sanctions on Moscow and backing a Ukraine and Europe-endorsed call for a 30-day ceasefire.
The contours of a temporary truce or permanent peace proposal have remained elusive, amid maximalist Russian demands and Zelenskyy's unwillingness to entertain potential territorial concessions.
"The U.S. has presented a strong peace plan and we welcome the Prisoner of War exchange agreement reached in Istanbul. Let's not miss this huge opportunity. The time for ending this war is now," U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on social media Saturday, following a call with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov.
"He explained to me that they are going to be preparing a document outlining their requirements for a ceasefire that will then lead to broader negotiations," Rubio said in a later TV interview with CBS. "Obviously, the Ukrainian side is going to be working on their own proposal. And hopefully that will be forthcoming soon."
Yet the signs of Washington's dwindling patience with the stalled process linger.
"We don't want to be involved in this process of just endless talks. There has to be some progress, some movement forward," Rubio stressed.
On Sunday, Zelenskyy also met with Rubio and U.S. Vice President J.D. Vance, decrying on social media the "low level delegation of non-decision-makers" deployed by Russia to Istanbul last week, adding that he reaffirmed that "Ukraine is ready to be engaged in real diplomacy and underscored the importance of a full and unconditional ceasefire as soon as possible."
Sidelined throughout much of the recent peace brokering, European officials have raced to engage with the White House, with British, U.S., Italian, French and German leaders discussing Trump's upcoming engagement with Putin during a call on Sunday.
"Looking ahead to President Trump's call with President Putin tomorrow, the leaders discussed the need for an unconditional ceasefire and for President Putin to take peace talks seriously," a British government readout said. "They also discussed the use of sanctions if Russia failed to engage seriously in a ceasefire and peace talks."
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