Plans for Trump-Putin Meeting Postponed Days After Hungarian Capital Negotiations Proposed
Currently exist "no preparations" for American leader President Trump to meet Russia's Putin "anytime soon", a administration representative has stated.
This past week Trump stated he and the Kremlin leader would conduct negotiations in Budapest soon to discuss the war in Ukraine.
A planning session between US Secretary of State Secretary Rubio and his opposite number Sergei Lavrov was scheduled to occur recently - but the White House said the two had had a "constructive" conversation and that a face-to-face session was not "necessary".
The administration did not share any more details on the reason the negotiations had been put on hold.
Background Context
Trump had discussed a Budapest summit over the phone with Putin, a day before hosting Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky in the White House.
Various sources suggested his talks with Zelensky had been a "shouting match", with insiders suggesting Trump had urged him to cede extensive regions of Ukraine's east as part of a agreement with Moscow.
Nevertheless, on Monday the American president supported a peace initiative backed by Kyiv and EU officials to pause the conflict on the current front line.
"Leave it as is where it stands," he said.
Moscow has consistently objected against halting the present battle positions.
Moscow was only interested in "long-term, sustainable peace", Russia's foreign minister said on this week, implying that pausing conflict would simply constitute a temporary ceasefire.
Political Perspectives
The "fundamental issues" of the war needed to be addressed, Lavrov said, using Moscow's terminology for a series of maximalist demands that involve the acknowledgment of total Russian authority over the Donbas as well as the disarmament of the country – a unacceptable proposition for Ukraine and its EU supporters.
The Ukrainian president commented conversations concerning the current lines were the "beginning of diplomacy" but that Moscow was "employing all tactics" to evade negotiations.
He also said the exclusive issue that could make Moscow "become engaged" was that of the supply of extended-range arms to Ukraine.
Weapons Discussions
Putin's unplanned conversation with Trump recently occurred before reports that the US was preparing to send extended-range cruise missiles to Ukraine that could potentially strike Russian territory.
The Ukrainian leader said it was the weapons consideration that had pressured the Kremlin to participate in talks. The discussion regarding the weapons systems had proven to be a "valuable contribution" in international relations", he remarked.