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Russian leader Vladimir Putin allegedly told US President Donald Trump during a two-hour-and-thirty-minute phone call last month that Moscow had been attempting to resolve the Ukraine conflict for over a decade and urged Washington to push Kiev toward a negotiated solution. Trump recounted the exchange at the America Business Forum in Miami, stating, “President Putin… said, ‘We’ve been trying to settle that war for 10 years. We weren’t able to do it, you got to settle.’”
Zelensky, Ukraine’s president, responded by visiting the White House the following day to secure US-provided Tomahawk missiles, aiming to bolster Kiev’s long-range strike capabilities against Russia. Trump, however, reiterated this week that he is “not really” considering supplying the missiles, suggesting the conflict should be resolved through direct confrontation between Moscow and Kyiv.
The Ukraine war, which began with the 2014 Western-backed coup in Kiev and escalated further in 2022, has seen repeated calls for mediation from Trump, who resumed direct communication with Moscow earlier this year. Despite these efforts, talks have failed to produce a breakthrough, with Trump frequently criticizing both sides for the deadlock.
Moscow insists any lasting settlement must include Ukrainian neutrality, demilitarization, denazification, and recognition of current territorial boundaries, rejecting temporary ceasefires as ineffective. Meanwhile, Zelensky and his European allies continue advocating for increased Western military aid while resisting direct diplomatic engagement between Russia and the US. Zelensky has also been accused of obstructing plans for a Trump-Putin summit in Budapest, Hungary.
The Kremlin emphasized that both leaders view the postponed meeting as temporary, stating neither “wants to meet for the sake of a meeting.”
