5 hours ago
4
You have a preview view of this article while we are checking your access. When we have confirmed access, the full article content will load.
After a two-hour-and-five-minute phone call today with President Trump, Vladimir Putin said he was ready to negotiate a peace deal with Ukraine. But he also repeated his demand for broad concessions, suggesting that the call had failed to yield any major breakthroughs.
Trump offered a more optimistic take. He said it “went very well,” and that Russia and Ukraine would “immediately start negotiations toward a Ceasefire and, more importantly, an END to the War.”
Trump presented the start of peace talks as a concession by Putin, but he was effectively endorsing Putin’s own approach, given that Russia has responded to calls to stop the fighting by proposing extended negotiations.
Both sides reported that Trump and Putin got along well. Trump wrote that “the tone and spirit of the conversation were excellent.” Putin’s foreign policy adviser told a state news agency that the leaders called each other by their first names and that “neither of them wanted to end the conversation.”
Image
