by Kevin Killough
President Donald Trump told Russian President Vladimir Putin on Sunday that he is ready to help end the conflict in Ukraine.
He called the end of hostilities “vital” during a conversation between the two leaders, which lasted nearly an hour, according to a statement from Kremlin foreign policy adviser Yuri Ushakov, Reuters reported.
Trump told Putin that an end to hostilities between the U.S. and Iran was close, and said he’s ready to work with European partners and Kyiv to bring about an end to the conflict in Ukraine. He said he’d be open to discussions at the G7 summit of industrialized countries, which happens this week in the French resort of Evian.
A rapid resolution, Trump said, would improve relations between the U.S. and Russia, but Putin said intensified strikes on Russian targets from Ukraine won’t change the situation on the battlefield.
Putin also said that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and Europeans at G7 would try to drag out the conflict and present the strikes as shifting momentum in Ukraine’s favor.
Zelensky said on Monday that Ukraine “offered Putin to meet anywhere where real decisions to end the war could be made.”
“He does not want it,” Zelensky said.
“We discussed with the U.S. and France the possibility of a meeting with Russia around the G7, with all democratic nations represented. Putin does not want it,” Zelensky said. “Yesterday, we discussed with President Trump that such a meeting could be organized in the U.S. – in a format where Putin would find it much harder to refuse at least to President Trump.”
“We will see what comes of it. If Russia refuses this chance as well, additional pressure will be needed,” he added.
On Monday, a Russian drone attack killed 11 people in Kyiv, Ukraine, including damaging Dormition Cathedral, a nearly 1,000-year-old Orthodox monastery, according to CNN.
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Kevin Killough is a reporter for Just the News. Zachery Schmidt is the digital editor of The Star News Network and contributed to this story.
