Washington, 19 Aug

US President Donald Trump says he has begun arrangements for a face-to-face meeting between Vladimir Putin and Volodymyr Zelenskyy to discuss a pathway to end Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

Trump made the announcement shortly after speaking by phone with Putin on Monday as he hosted Zelenskyy and top European leaders to discuss his push to end the brutal war. The talks came amid a significant measure of trepidation on the continent that Trump is pressing Ukraine to make concessions that will only further embolden Putin.

“I called President Putin, and began the arrangements for a meeting, at a location to be determined, between President Putin and President Zelenskyy,” Trump said in a social media post soon after lengthy talks with Zelenskyy and the European leaders ended.

“After that meeting takes place, we will have a Trilat, which would be the two Presidents, plus myself. Again, this was a very good, early step for a War that has been going on for almost four years.”

It was not clear if Putin has fully signed on to such talks.

Russia state news agency Tass cited Putin's foreign affairs adviser Yuri Ushakov saying Putin and Trump “spoke in favor” of continuing direct talks between the Russian and Ukrainian delegations. Ushakov said they also discussed “the idea of raising the level of the direct Russian-Ukrainian negotiations.”

Zelenskyy told reporters following the White House meeting that if Russia does “not demonstrate a will to meet, we will ask the United States to act accordingly.”

NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte, who attended the White House talks, added in an appearance on Fox News that “if Russia is not playing ball” on direct talks with Ukraine “the United States plus Europe will do more when it comes to tariffs and sanctions” on Moscow.

Zelenskyy previously had said he wanted Russia to agree to aceasefire before any meeting between himself and Putin, but he said Monday that if the Ukrainians started setting conditions, the Russians would do the same.

“That's why I believe that we must meet without any conditions, and think about what development there can be of this path to the end of war,” Zelenskyy said.

Earlier, Trump said during talks with Zelenskyy and the European leaders that a potential ceasefire and who gets Ukrainian territory seized by Russia should be hashed out during a face-to-face meet between the warring countries' two leaders.

That was a shift from comments Trump made soon after meeting Putin last week in which he appeared to tilt toward Putin's demands that Ukraine make concessions over land seized by Russia, which now controls roughly one-fifth of Ukrainian territory.

Questions about US and NATO involvement

Trump also announced on Monday he would back European security guarantees for Ukraine as he met with Zelenskyy and the leaders of France, Britain, Germany, Italy and Finland, as well as the president of the European Commission and the head of NATO.

Trump stopped short of committing U.S. troops to a collective effort to bolster Ukraine's security. He said instead that there would be a “NATO-like” security presence and that all those details would be hashed out with EU leaders.

“They want to give protection and they feel very strongly about it and we'll help them out with that,” Trump said.

Zelenskyy said deep U.S. involvement in the emerging security guarantees is crucial. “It is important that the United States make a clear signal, namely that they will be among the countries that will help to coordinate and also will participate in security guarantees for Ukraine,” Zelenskyy said.

Speaking Monday before the White House meetings took place, Russia's Foreign Ministry rejected the idea of a possible NATO peacekeeping force in Ukraine. Such a scenario could lead to further escalation and “unpredictable consequences,” ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova warned.

Trump's engagement with Zelenskyy had a strikingly different feel to their last Oval Office meeting in February. It was a disastrous moment that led to Trump abruptly ending talks with the Ukrainian delegation, and temporarily halting some aid for Kyiv, after he and Vice President JD Vance complained that Zelenskyy had shown insufficient gratitude for U.S. military assistance.

At the start of Monday's meeting, Zelenskyy presented a letter from his wife, Olena Zelenska, for Trump's wife, Melania. Trump during the Alaska summit had hand-delivered a letter to Putin, from the US First lady, urging him to consider the children impacted by the conflict and bring an end to the brutal 3 1/2 year war.

Zelenskyy faced criticism during his February meeting from a conservative journalist for appearing in the Oval Office in a long-sleeve T-shirt. This time he appeared in a dark jacket and buttoned shirt. Zelenskyy has said his typically less formal attire since the start of the full-scale Russian invasion in 2022 is to show solidarity with Ukrainian soldiers.

“We'll see in a certain period of time, not very far from now, a week or two weeks, we're going to know whether or not we're going to solve this or is this horrible fighting going to continue,” Trump said.

European leaders arrived in Washington looking to safeguard Ukraine and the continent from any widening aggression from Moscow.

Ahead of Monday's meeting, Trump suggested that Ukraine could not regain Crimea, which Russia annexed in 2014, setting off an armed conflict that led to its broader 2022 invasion.

Zelenskyy in his own post late Sunday, responded, “We all share a strong desire to end this war quickly and reliably.” He said “peace must be lasting,” not as it was after Russia seized Crimea and part of the Donbas in eastern Ukraine eight years ago and “Putin simply used it as aspringboard for a new attack.”