{"id":342188,"date":"2025-08-13T21:43:14","date_gmt":"2025-08-13T21:43:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/342188\/"},"modified":"2025-08-13T21:43:14","modified_gmt":"2025-08-13T21:43:14","slug":"trump-touts-second-trilateral-meeting-before-putin-summit-zelenskyy-pushes-russia-ukraine-war-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/342188\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump touts second trilateral meeting before Putin summit; Zelenskyy pushes | Russia-Ukraine war News"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has reiterated that there should be no peace talks to end the Russia-Ukraine war now in its fourth year without representation from his country, and also said Russia should face sanctions if it does not agree to an immediate ceasefire, following a virtual meeting<\/a> between him, United States President Donald Trump and European leaders.<\/p>\n

Zelenskyy delivered the message after the call on Wednesday, two days ahead of a summit between Trump and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin in Alaska, which comes as part of Washington\u2019s so far failed attempts to end the war in Ukraine.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Trump promised to hold trilateral talks with both Ukraine and Russia, if Friday\u2019s summit \u201cgoes OK\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cI would like to do it immediately,\u201d he said. \u201cWe\u2019ll have a quick second meeting between President Putin and President Zelenskyy and myself if they\u2019d like to have me there.\u201d<\/p>\n

The US president also vowed that Moscow would face \u201csevere consequences\u201d if Putin did not agree to end its war.<\/p>\n

In a joint statement, leaders of the UK, France and Germany said that Russia should face tougher sanctions if it fails to agree to a ceasefire on Friday.<\/p>\n

Kyiv must also be given \u201crobust and credible security guarantees\u201d and have no limitations placed on its armed forces or on its cooperation with other countries, they added.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Coalition of the Willing is ready to play an active role, including through plans by those willing to deploy a reassurance force once hostilities have ceased.\u201d<\/p>\n

The rapid developments came after Trump met virtually with Zelenskyy and other European leaders including France\u2019s Emmanuel Macron and the United Kingdom\u2019s Keir Starmer on Wednesday.<\/p>\n

Arranged in a bid for Europe to try and influence Trump\u2019s meeting with Putin on Friday, this second call took place after talks earlier in the day between Zelenskyy, European leaders and the heads of NATO and the European Union.<\/p>\n

Thanking German Chancellor Friedrich Merz for hosting the meetings, Zelenskyy said on X that Ukraine and Europe were \u201ccooperating constructively with the United States\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cI hope that today we have come closer to ending the war and building a guaranteed peaceful future,\u201d he concluded.<\/p>\n

Trump and European leaders called their joint meeting a success, with the US president describing it as a \u201cvery good call\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cI would rate it a 10. Very friendly,\u201d he said, speaking during a press conference at the Kennedy Center.<\/p>\n

Trump noted that he would be calling Zelenskyy and European leaders immediately following his meeting with Putin.<\/p>\n

At a press conference with Merz, Zelenskyy expressed his hope that the Trump-Putin summit would focus on an \u201cimmediate ceasefire\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cSanctions must be in place and must be strengthened if Russia does not agree to a ceasefire,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

Zelenskyy accuses Putin of \u2018bluffing\u2019 about peace talks<\/p>\n

As the Russian army continues to make sizable territorial gains in the east Ukrainian province of Donetsk<\/a>, Zelenskyy told the US president and his European colleagues that Putin was \u201cbluffing\u201d about pursuing peace.<\/p>\n

His choice of words, a term commonly used in reference to poker, evoked Trump telling Zelenskyy, \u201cyou don\u2019t have the cards\u201d in the infamously hostile<\/a> news conference at the White House on February 28th.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe is trying to apply pressure before the meeting in Alaska along all parts of the Ukrainian front,\u201d Zelenskyy suggested. \u201cRussia is trying to show that it can occupy all of Ukraine.\u201d<\/p>\n

After the Trump call, Merz, who described the meeting as \u201cexceptionally constructive\u201d, stressed that Ukraine is willing to negotiate, but noted that \u201clegal recognition of Russian occupation is not up for debate\u201d.<\/p>\n

\"USUS President Donald Trump speaks during the unveiling of the Kennedy Center Honors nominees on August 13, 2025, at the Kennedy Center in Washington, DC, the US [Mandel Ngan\/ AFP]<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThe principle that borders cannot be changed by force must continue to apply,\u201d Merz said.<\/p>\n

\u201cNegotiations must include robust security guarantees for Kyiv,\u201d he added. \u201cThe Ukrainian armed forces must be able and remain able to effectively defend the sovereignty of their country. They must also be able to count on Western aid in the long term.\u201d<\/p>\n

After the online meeting, France\u2019s Macron said Trump would be seeking a ceasefire in Ukraine during his meeting with Putin on Friday.<\/p>\n

The US president would also seek a trilateral meeting with Putin and Zelenskyy in the future, the French president noted.<\/p>\n

The Trump-Putin summit in Alaska has been a cause for anxiety in Kyiv and Europe more widely, after Trump declared that both Ukraine and Russia would have to swap land if a truce is to be reached.<\/p>\n

Speaking from the UK on Wednesday, JD Vance, the US vice-president, seemed to try to allay fears in Europe.<\/p>\n

\u201cI just talked to him [Trump] right before I came on the stage, and he said very simply that we are going to make it our mission as an administration to bring peace to Europe once again,\u201d Vance said.<\/p>\n

Reporting from Berlin, Al Jazeera\u2019s Step Vaessen said there was \u201csome optimism\u201d in Europe that Trump had agreed to Wednesday\u2019s meeting.<\/p>\n

However, Vaessen noted that European leaders were still \u201cconcerned that everything changes as soon as President Trump is in that room with President Putin, who they know is a very keen, a very sharp negotiator\u201d.<\/p>\n

Elsewhere, the Russian Foreign Ministry sought to downplay the relevance of Europe\u2019s last-minute diplomatic efforts with Trump, branding them \u201cpractically insignificant\u201d.<\/p>\n

On the battlefield, Russia has claimed to have captured the villages of Suvorovo and Nikanorovka as its gains in Donetsk continue, with the Ukrainian authorities issuing evacuation orders for around a dozen settlements.<\/p>\n

The Kremlin\u2019s forces achieved their largest 24-hour advance in more than a year on Tuesday, according to data from the US-based Institute for the Study of War.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has reiterated that there should be no peace talks to end the Russia-Ukraine war…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":342189,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7655],"tags":[32,299,12,332,7661,657,333],"class_list":{"0":"post-342188","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-russia","8":"tag-donald-trump","9":"tag-europe","10":"tag-news","11":"tag-russia","12":"tag-russia-ukraine-war","13":"tag-ukraine","14":"tag-vladimir-putin"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115023642880094035","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/342188","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=342188"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/342188\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/342189"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=342188"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=342188"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=342188"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}