Zelenskyy, Trump express hope for trilateral talks with Putin to bring end to Russia-Ukraine war

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and President Donald Trump expressed hope that Monday’s critical talks with Ukrainian and European leaders at the White House could lead to trilateral talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin to bring an end to Russia’s war on Ukraine.

The U.S. president also said he would back European security guarantees for Ukraine.

 

Trump stopped short of committing U.S. troops to the effort, saying instead that there would be a “NATO-like” security presence but that all those details would be hashed out in their afternoon meeting 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. “I think its very important to get the deal done.”

Monday’s hastily assembled meeting comes after Trump met on Friday with Russian President Vladimir Putin and has said that the onus is now on Zelenskyy to agree to concessions that he said could end the war.

“If everything works out today, we’ll have a trilat,” Trump said, referring to possible three-way talks among Zelenskyy, Putin and Trump. “We’re going to work with Russia, we’re going to work with Ukraine.”

Trump also said he plans to talk to Putin after his meetings with Zelenskyy and European leaders.

Zelenskyy also expressed openness to trilateral talks.

“We are ready for trilateral as president said,” Zelenskyy said at the start of his meeting with Trump. “It’s a good signal about trilateral. I think this is very good.”

Trump is first holding one-on-one talks with Zelenskyy. The two are then scheduled to gather with European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, French President Emmanuel Macron, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, Italian Premier Giorgia Meloni, Finnish President Alexander Stubb and NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte.

The European leaders were left out of Trump’s summit with Putin. They want to safeguard Ukraine and the continent from any widening aggression from Moscow. Many arrived at the White House with the explicit goal of protecting Ukraine’s interests — a rare show of diplomatic force.

By coming as a group, they hope to avoid debacles like Zelenskyy’s February meeting in the Oval Office, where Trump chastised him for not showing enough gratitude for U.S. military aid. Trump and Zelenskyy were due to meet in the Oval Office before European leaders join them in the East Room for talks.

The meetings are also a test of America’s relationship with its closest allies after the European Union and United Kingdom accepted Trump’s tariff hikes partly because they wanted his support on Ukraine.

“We understand that we shouldn’t expect Putin to voluntarily abandon aggression and new attempts at conquest,” Zelenskyy said in an X posting before arriving at the White House. “That is why pressure must work, and it must be joint pressure – from the United States and Europe, and from everyone in the world who respects the right to life and the international order.”

Ahead of the meeting, however, 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.

“President Zelenskyy of Ukraine can end the war with Russia almost immediately, if he wants to, or he can continue to fight,” Trump wrote Sunday night on social media. “Remember how it started. No getting back Obama given Crimea (12 years ago, without a shot being fired!), and NO GOING INTO NATO BY UKRAINE. Some things never change!!!”

Zelenskyy appeared to respond with his own post late Sunday, saying, “We all share a strong desire to end this war quickly and reliably.” He said that “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 a springboard for a new attack.”

Trump’s sitdown in Alaska with Putin yielded the possible contours for stopping the war in Ukraine, though it was unclear whether the terms discussed would ultimately be acceptable to Zelenskyy or Putin.

Zelenskyy said in a social media post he met with Trump’s special envoy for Ukraine, Keith Kellogg, on Monday ahead of his scheduled talks with Trump to discuss the battlefield situation and the shared “strong diplomatic capabilities” of the U.S., Ukraine and Europe. He also held talks with European leaders at the Ukrainian embassy in Washington.

European heavyweights in Washington

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, French President Emmanuel Macron, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, Italian Premier Giorgia Meloni, Finnish President Alexander Stubb and NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte arrived at the White House ahead of Zelenskyy’s arrival.

On the table for discussion are possible NATO-like security guarantees that Ukraine would need for any peace with Russia to be durable. Putin opposes Ukraine joining NATO outright, yet Trump’s team claims the Russian leader is open to allies agreeing to defend Ukraine if it comes under attack.

”Clearly there are no easy solutions when talking about ending a war and building peace,” Meloni told reporters. “We have to explore all possible solutions to guarantee peace, to guarantee justice, and to guarantee security for our countries.”

The European leaders are aiming to keep the focus during the White House talks on finding a sustainable peace and believe forging a temporary ceasefire is not off the table, according to a European official.

The official, who was not authorized to comment publicly and spoke on the condition of anonymity, said the leaders are also looking to keep pressure on Russia to end the fighting and want to get more concrete assurances from the U.S. about security guarantees for Ukraine as part of any deal.

Trump briefed Zelenskyy and European allies shortly after the Putin meeting. Details from the discussions emerged in a scattershot way that seemed to rankle the U.S. president, who had chosen not to outline any terms when appearing afterward with Putin.

Ahead of Monday’s White House meetings, Trump took to social media to say that even if Russia said, “We give up, we concede, we surrender” the news media and Democrats “would say that this was a bad and humiliating day for Donald J. Trump.” He separately lashed out at the Wall Street Journal and other outlets “who truly don’t have a clue, tell me everything that I am doing wrong on the Russia/Ukraine MESS.”

Following the Alaska summit, Trump declared that a ceasefire was not necessary for peace talks to proceed, a sudden shift to a position favored by Putin.

‘A very big move’

European officials confirmed that Trump told them Putin is still seeking control of the entire Donbas region, even though Ukraine controls a meaningful share of it.

Trump’s special envoy, Steve Witkoff, said the U.S. and its allies could offer Ukraine a NATO-like commitment to defend the country if it came under attack as the possible security guarantee, with details to be worked out.

Monday’s meeting will likely be very tough for Zelenskyy, an official close to the ongoing talks said. That official spoke on condition of anonymity to speak openly about thinking within Ukraine and between allies.

Zelenskyy needs to prevent a scenario in which he gets blamed for blocking peace talks by rejecting Putin’s maximalist demand on the Donbas, the official said. It is a demand Zelenskyy has said many times he will never accept because it is unconstitutional and could create a launching pad for future Russian attacks.

If confronted with pressure to accept Putin’s demands, Zelenskyy would likely have to revert to a skill he has demonstrated time and again: diplomatic tact. The Ukrainian leadership is seeking a trilateral meeting with Zelenskyy, Trump and Putin to discuss sensitive matters, including territorial issues.

Putin spoke with the leaders of India, Brazil and South Africa Monday to discuss his meeting with Trump in Alaska, the Kremlin said.

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Kullab reported from Kyiv, Ukraine. Associated Press writers Sylvie Corbet in Washington, John Leicester in Le Pecq, France, Illia Novikov in Kyiv and Dasha Litvinova in Tallinn, Estonia and Nicole Winfield in Rome, contributed.