A meeting between Russian President Vladimir Putin and U.S. President Donald Trump has been agreed, a Kremlin official said Thursday, on the eve of a White House deadline for Moscow to show progress toward ending the 3-year-old war in Ukraine.
Putin’s foreign affairs adviser Yuri Ushakov said a summit could possibly take place next week at a venue that has been decided “in principle.”
He brushed aside the possibility of Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy joining the summit, something the White House had said Trump was ready to consider. Putin has spurned Zelenskyy’s previous offers of a meeting to clinch a breakthrough.
“We propose, first of all, to focus on preparing a bilateral meeting with Trump, and we consider it most important that this meeting be successful and productive,” Ushakov said, adding that U.S. special envoy Steve Witkoff's suggestion of a meeting including Ukraine's leader “was not specifically discussed.”
The impact of the announced meeting on Trump’s Friday deadline for Russia to show progress remains to be seen.
The meeting would be the first U.S.-Russia summit since 2021, when former President Joe Biden met Putin in Geneva. It would be a significant milestone toward Trump’s effort to end the war, although Moscow and Kyiv continue to remain far apart on peace terms.
Next week is the target date for a summit, Ushakov said, while noting that such events take time to organize and no date is confirmed. The possible venue will be announced “a little later," he said.
Despite continued diplomacy, the war persists, killing tens of thousands of troops on both sides as well as more than 12,000 Ukrainian civilians, according to the United Nations.
Western officials have repeatedly accused Putin of stalling for time in peace negotiations to allow Russian forces time to capture more Ukrainian land. Putin previously has offered no concessions and will only accept a settlement on his terms.
A meeting between Putin and Trump on the war would be a departure from the Biden administration’s policy of “nothing about Ukraine without Ukraine” — a key demand from Kyiv.
Zelenskyy said he planned calls with European leaders Thursday to discuss the latest developments.
A ceasefire and long-term security guarantees are priorities in potential negotiation with Russia, he said on social media.
Securing a truce, deciding a format for a summit and providing assurances for Ukraine’s future protection from invasion — a consideration that must involve the U.S. and Europe — are crucial aspects to address, Zelenskyy said.
He noted that Russian strikes on civilians haven't eased off despite Trump publicly urging Putin to relent.
A Russian attack Wednesday in the central Dnipro region killed four people and injured eight others, he said.
A new Gallup poll published Thursday found that Ukrainians are increasingly eager for a settlement that ends the fight against Russia’s invasion.
The enthusiasm for a negotiated deal is a sharp reversal from 2022 — the year the war began — when Gallup found that about three-quarters of Ukrainians wanted to keep fighting until victory. Now only about one-quarter hold that view, with support for continuing the war declining steadily across all regions and demographic groups.
The findings were based on samples of 1,000 or more respondents ages 15 and older living in Ukraine. Some territories under entrenched Russian control, representing about 10% of the population, were excluded from surveys conducted after 2022 due to lack of access.
Since the start of the full-scale war, Russia’s relentless pounding of urban areas behind the front line has killed more than 12,000 Ukrainian civilians, according to the United Nations. On the 1,000-kilometer (620-mile) front line snaking from northeast to southeast Ukraine, where tens of thousands of troops on both sides have died, Russia’s bigger army is slowly capturing more land.
In the new Gallup survey, conducted in early July, about seven in 10 Ukrainians say their country should seek to negotiate a settlement as soon as possible. Zelenskyy last month renewed his offer to meet with Putin, but his overture was rebuffed.
Most Ukrainians do not expect a lasting peace anytime soon, the poll found. Only about one-quarter say it’s “very” or “somewhat” likely that active fighting will end within the next 12 months, while about seven in 10 think it’s “somewhat” or “very” unlikely that active fighting will be over in the next year.
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