Donald Trump has expressed the belief following a phone call with Vladimir Putin that Russia will “immediately start negotiations towards a ceasefire and, more importantly an end to the war” in Ukraine.
The US president also spoke to Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelenskiy before and after his two-hour dialogue with Putin on Monday.
While Mr Trump was optimistic about the conversation and praised the “tone and spirit”, no definitive breakthrough was achieved, nor did Russia accede to the 30-day ceasefire proposed by the US.
The Russian president was more circumspect and ambivalent in an interview with state television on Monday, describing the conversation as “very informative and very frank”.
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“I for my part also noted that Russia also supports a peaceful settlement of the Ukraine crisis,” Mr Putin said.
“We must simply determine the most effective paths toward peace.”
He said Russia was ready to deal with Ukraine with a view to establishing “a memorandum regarding a possible future peace treaty defining a number of positions such as, for example, the principles of settlement, the timing of a possible peace agreement, including a possible ceasefire for a certain period”.
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Mr Trump, in a social media post, suggested the Vatican as a suitable and willing host for the negotiations.
Putin’s foreign policy adviser, Yuri Ushakov, said a potential nine-person mutual prisoner swap had been discussed and that both presidents had addressed one another on an informal, first-name basis. According to the Russian state agency Tass, Mr Ushakov said neither leader “wanted to end the conversation”.
Speaking in Kyiv after the conversation, Mr Zelenskiy suggested that “a meeting of all teams at a very high level” may be imminent while reiterating the position that his country will never withdraw its forces from Ukrainian territory, nor yield to Russian ultimatums.
Monday’s conversation follows last week’s US-Russia engagement in Istanbul, Turkey, which failed to yield the result Mr Trump had made a priority since returning to office in January. He has recently indicated his frustration with president Putin.
Mr Trump spoke to several European leaders after his phone call with Putin.
Ursula von der Leyen, the European Commission president, thanked the US president for “his tireless efforts to bring a ceasefire to Ukraine” in a social media post and noted that it is “important that the US stays engaged”.
Pre-empting the phone call on Monday, US vice-president JD Vance emphasised the potential economic benefits for Russia of working out a peace treaty.
“I think the [US] president is going to say to president Putin: look, are you serious? Are you real about this?” Mr Vance said.
“Because the proposal from the United States has always been: look, there’s a lot of economic benefits to thawing relations between Russia and the rest of the world. But you are not going to get those benefits if you keep on killing a lot of innocent people.”
