President Donald Trump is set to speak with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday as part of his administration’s efforts to bring an end to Russia’s war in Ukraine.
Speaking aboard Air Force One on Sunday night while returning to Washington, D.C., Trump said that “a lot of work” had been done over the weekend and hinted at a possible announcement. “Maybe by Tuesday,” he said. “We’ll see if we have something to announce.” He added, “We want to see if we can bring that war to an end.”
“Maybe we can. Maybe we can’t, but I think we have a very good chance,” Trump said. On Monday, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov confirmed that the call had been scheduled.
The Trump administration has been engaging in diplomatic efforts to push both Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy toward negotiations. This included recent talks in Saudi Arabia aimed at securing a potential 30-day ceasefire. While Putin has expressed openness to discussions, he has also emphasized the need for further security guarantees. Zelenskyy, on the other hand, has accused Russia of prolonging the war.
In his Sunday night address, Zelenskyy reiterated that point, stating, “Russia stole almost another week — a week of war that only Russia wants.” He stressed Ukraine’s commitment to diplomacy but underscored the importance of continued defense efforts. “We must remember — as long as the occupier is on our land, and as long as air raid sirens sound, we must defend Ukraine,” he said, according to a translated transcript from his office.
Zelenskyy has consistently maintained that Ukraine’s goal is to reclaim all territory lost since Russia’s invasion, including Crimea, which was annexed in 2014. Putin has also signaled his intention to retake all land captured by Ukrainian forces, particularly in Kursk, a Russian border region seized by Ukraine last summer.
When asked about possible concessions that could be included in a ceasefire agreement, Trump suggested that discussions about land and power plants were ongoing. “Well, I think we’ll be talking about land. It’s a lot of land,” he said on Sunday. “It’s a lot different than it was before the wars, you know. And we’ll be talking about land, we’ll be talking about power plants. That’s a big question, but I think we have a lot of it already discussed, very much by both sides.”
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