A much-hyped phone call between Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin on Monday was followed up by optimistic statements by the pair, but there are doubts over whether it marked any real progress towards peace in Ukraine.
Days after Ukrainian and Russian negotiators in Istanbul met for the first time in three years, the White House had hoped this conversation would demonstrate Mr Trump’s influence in the Kremlin, as he tries to push his Russian counterpart towards a ceasefire.
The US president had expected a “productive day” in which he also spoke to Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky and other Western leaders in a bid to end the bloodbath in Ukraine.
But the results appear to fall short of any concrete developments towards peace in Ukraine, instead merely laying the groundwork for more talks between Moscow and Kyiv.
What came out of the Trump-Putin call?
Mr Trump said on Truth Social that the call went “very well”, adding that Moscow and Kyiv will “immediately” begin ceasefire talks with the aim of bringing an end to the war.
The conditions of this ceasefire will be “negotiated between the two parties, as it can only be, because they know details of a negotiation that nobody else would be aware of”, he said.
Mr Putin said he is prepared to work with Ukraine to establish a "memorandum on a possible future peace agreement", but in his remarks did not address any of the other demands made by Washington and Europe, including a 30-day unconditional ceasefire to allow for long-term peace negotiations.
Talks could, Mr Trump suggested, be held at the Vatican. Following the Istanbul talks on Friday, Pope Leo XIV, who has called for peace in Ukraine multiple times in the first days of his papacy, had offered to hold direct talks between the countries.
Mr Trump said the “tone” of his call with Mr Putin was “excellent” and suggested that the Russian leader had expressed a desire for “largescale TRADE” with the US after the war ends. Kyiv could also benefit from further trade with Washington, he added.
Mr Putin was also outwardly positive about the call, in which he appears to have avoided making the concrete commitments towards peace which Mr Trump has sought from Moscow.
He said Russia is ready to work towards ending the fighting in Ukraine, and that both Moscow and Kyiv would need to find compromises to suit all parties to “simply determine the most effective paths towards peace”.
Moscow is likely to be content with the result, again showing that it can resist pressure from the Trump administration to accept the 30-day ceasefire – a proposal to which Kyiv has already agreed.
Mr Zelensky said on Tuesday the call was a “defining moment” but added that Mr Putin is “trying to buy time” and to continue the war in Ukraine.
“We are working with our partners to ensure that pressure forces Russians to change their behaviour. Sanctions matter, and I am grateful to everyone making them more biting for those responsible for this war,” he wrote on social media on Tuesday.
What comes next?
Mr Zelensky has continued to engage in a flurry of diplomacy with calls to Kyiv’s allies on Tuesday.
Meanwhile, contacts are set to be made between Russia and Ukraine to organise further peace talks, where they will agree to a ceasefire memorandum aimed at ending the war in Ukraine. Mr Trump said talks will begin “immediately”, but there has been no talk of when this could be.
Moscow appears keen to delay the production of this memorandum. Spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said on Tuesday that there is no fixed deadline before which it needs to be produced, adding that there “cannot be any”.
He said, according to the RIA state news agency: “It is clear that everyone wants to do this as quickly as possible, but, of course, the devil is in the details.”
It is hoped that the talks will bring Moscow and Kyiv closer than they were on Friday, when there was a significant chasm between the sides on key issues.
Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova said on Tuesday that Ukraine needed to decide whether or not it would “cooperate” in discussing a memorandum ahead of a future peace accord.
According to Bloomberg, Russia had demanded that Ukraine adopt a neutral status and have no foreign troops on their soil, officially renounce claims for reparations from Russia, and recognise the annexation of Crimea and four other Ukrainian regions – even though they weren’t under full Russian control.
But if the sides can’t bring themselves closer to each other, Mr Trump has warned he is still ready to end the US-led peace efforts despite yesterday’s call – something Washington has been threatening for weeks.
He said there are “some big egos involved”, and that without any progress he will “back away”.
“This is not my war,” Mr Trump said, “... [I] have a red line in my head on when I’ll stop pushing on Russia-Ukraine.”
