US President Donald Trump is scheduled to hold a telephone conversation with the Russian leader Vladimir Putin any time before this week ends.
“I expect that there will be a call with both presidents this week,” said US envoy Steve Witkoff who spoke to President Putin for several hours in Moscow on Thursday.
The Trump administration early this week proposed a 30-day temporary ceasefire agreement and wants Russia to accept it.
“We’re also continuing to engage and have conversation with the Ukrainians and hope to see ‘real progress’ in ending the conflict soon,” Witkoff said.
Although Ukraine has accepted the 30-day ceasefire, President Putin has given no clear answer, instead listing a string of conditions and raising “serious questions” over the proposals.
Mike Waltz, Trump’s national security adviser, said that Ukraine will likely have to cede territory and that negotiations have to be grounded in “reality”.
Asked whether the US would accept a peace deal in which Russia was allowed to keep stretches of eastern Ukraine it has seized, Mr Waltz replied, “Is it realistic? We’ve talked to the Europeans about this, and the Ukrainians. Are we going to drive every Russian off of every inch of Ukrainian soil, including Crimea?”
He added that the negotiations had to be grounded in “reality.”
Separately, Marco Rubio, US secretary of state, told press that a final peace deal would “involve a lot of hard work, concessions from both Russia and Ukraine,” and that it would be difficult to even begin those negotiations “as long as they’re shooting at each other.”
