Speaking at the end of his West Asia tour, Trump underscored that current diplomatic efforts will likely stall unless he and Putin engage directly
President Donald Trump on Saturday said that he will hold separate phone calls with his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian’s Volodymyr Zelenskyy, with an aim to stop the “bloodbath.”
“I will be speaking, by telephone, to President Vladimir Putin of Russia on Monday, at 10:00 am The subjects of the call will be stopping the ‘bloodbath’ that is killing, on average, more than 5,000 Russian and Ukrainian soldiers a week, and trade…,” Trump wrote on his social media ‘Truth Social’.
“I will then be speaking to President Zelenskyy of Ukraine and then, with President Zelenskyy, various members of NATO. 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. God bless us all!!!” he added. Trump on Friday said he plans to meet with Putin “as soon as we can set it up,” suggesting that his personal involvement is essential to resolve the Russia-Ukraine war.
Speaking at the end of his West Asia tour, Trump underscored that current diplomatic efforts will likely stall unless he and Putin engage directly. His remarks came just ahead of a scheduled meeting between Russian and Ukrainian officials in Turkey–the first in-person talks since the early stages of the conflict. Despite the significance of the event, the United States has downplayed the possibility of any real breakthrough, and Trump expressed similar doubts.
“Nothing” is going to happen on Ukraine until he and Putin meet, he said, positioning their meeting as a turning point in the stalled peace process. “I think it’s time for us to just do it. I said, you know, they all said Putin was going and Zelenskyy was going. And I said, If I don’t go, I guarantee Putin is not going, and he didn’t go. I understand that – but we’re going to get it – we’re going to get it done. We’re going to get it done. 5,000 young people are being killed every single week on average, and we’re going to get it done,” Trump said, citing the human cost of the war.
When asked when the meeting could take place, Trump replied, “As soon as we can set it up. I was going to – I would actually leave here and go. I do want to see my beautiful grandson, and we’ll be doing that.” His daughter Tiffany Trump gave birth on Thursday, marking his 11th grandchild.
Trump also weighed in on Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s absence from Thursday’s talks. “He didn’t show up because he heard Putin wasn’t going,” he said. Trump added, “He wasn’t going if I wasn’t there and I don’t believe anything’s going to happen, whether you like it or not, until he and I get together.”
Earlier, the first direct talks between Moscow and Kyiv since Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022 ended after less than two hours on Friday.
No agreement was reached concerning a full 30-day ceasefire and Moscow reportedly demanded Kyiv withdraw from four regions it invaded. Ukrainian media reported these four regions were Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson – none of which Russia fully controls.
According to both delegations, the two sides agreed to exchange 1,000 prisoners of war each – the largest such swap since the war began. Turkey’s foreign minister Hakan Fidan said both sides have agreed “in principle” to meet again.
Speaking the next day, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said that Russian President Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy could meet once negotiators manage to reach “certain agreements”, without specifying what those might be.
Chief Ukrainian delegate Defence Minister Rustem Umerov said both sides also discussed a meeting between their heads of state. Russian presidential aide Vladimir Medinsky, who headed Moscow’s delegation, said both sides agreed to provide detailed ceasefire proposals.
Ukrainian President Volodymr Zelenskyy said he discussed the talks with allies from the US, France, Germany, the UK and Poland. In a post on X, he urged “tough sanctions” against Moscow if it rejects “a full and unconditional ceasefire and an end to the killings.”
Zelenskyy was in Albania with the leaders of dozens of European countries to discuss security, defence and democratic standards amid Russia’s war on Ukraine. Trump, who has pressed both Moscow and Kyiv for an end to the conflict, said a meeting between himself and Russian President Vladimir Putin would happen “as soon as we can set it up.”
“I think it’s time for us to just do it,” Trump told reporters in Abu Dhabi, concluding a trip to the Middle East.
