Zelensky believes he's the only one who can stop Putin, but Trump withdraws from the trilateral meeting: "I'd prefer not to."
The meeting between the leaders
A Putin-Zelensky meeting is not yet scheduled, but the Russian president is open to such a meeting as soon as the agenda is finalized.
US President Donald Trump is the only person who can stop Russian President Vladimir Putin today, Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelensky said, as reported by UNIAN, during a joint press conference with NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte.
Asked for details on how preparations for the bilateral meeting with Putin are progressing, speaking of talks with partners in Washington, he noted that " we have no agreements with the Russians, we are negotiating with President Trump." "And he is the only person who can stop Putin today. In my opinion. And we agreed that it is right to proceed in a diplomatic direction. I supported this direction, proposed by President Trump. We are talking about a trilateral meeting, which is necessary. Then he had contacts with the Russian side and said: 'First let's take a bilateral path.' And this is the Russians' proposal, he said... And then—a trilateral one." However, Trump backed out: " We will see if Vladimir Putin and Volodymyr Zelensky will work together. And we will see if I have to be there; I would prefer not to, " the tycoon said. " Strong security guarantees for Ukraine are essential, and we are working on it," Rutte declared. Nobody knows what they are, since the final word belongs to the vacillating tycoon.
In Kiev, an airstrike warning signal was sounded during the NATO Secretary General's visit. As for Moscow, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said that at Monday's meeting in Washington between Zelensky and Trump, the Ukrainian president rejected all of the US president's proposals for a solution to the conflict. This was reported by the Tass news agency. A Putin-Zelensky meeting is not yet scheduled, but the Russian president is open to such a meeting as soon as the agenda is finalized, Lavrov added. According to Kremlin sources cited by Reuters, Russia claims the entire Donbass region, as well as demanding Ukraine's neutrality, the abandonment of Kiev's ambition to join NATO , and the abandonment of plans to deploy European troops in Ukraine as a peacekeeping contingent. In exchange, Moscow would be willing to return the small portions of the Ukrainian regions of Kharkiv, Sumy , and Dnipropetrovsk currently under Russian control.
Compared to the initial demands formulated by President Putin, the Kremlin appears to be toning down the territorial demands expressed in June 2024, in which it demanded that Kiev cede the entirety of the four regions that Moscow claims as part of Russia: Donetsk and Luhansk in eastern Ukraine, as well as Kherson and Zaporizhia in the south. Between dialectical skirmishes, warnings, and surprise visits, the 1,276th day of war in Ukraine has unfolded.
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