President Donald Trump’s plan to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin is on hold after a call between Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs Sergey Lavrov. Trump previously said he and Putin would meet in Hungary to discuss ending the war in Ukraine.
According to White House officials, Trump and Putin have no plans to meet in the immediate future. Nevertheless, the White House said the call between Rubio and Lavrov was “productive.”
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Why did the meeting fizzle out?
Trump officials said that the call between Rubio and Lavrov made additional meetings “not necessary.”
When Trump announced the meeting, he said it would take place “within two weeks.”
The planned meeting was a result of a phone call between Putin and Trump before he met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy at the White House last Friday.
Both sides said the call was positive but did not discuss what was said.
Trump and Zelenskyy discussed the U.S. sending long-range Tomahawk missiles to Ukraine, which the president had seemed to favor. However, Trump later backed down from the idea, saying it would amount to an escalation of the war.
Now what?
As the discussion over a peace deal continues, the war in Ukraine stretches on. Most recently, Ukrainian drones struck a Russian gas plant on Sunday. The attack damaged the plant and sparked a fire.
Following his meeting with Trump, Zelenskyy spoke with European leaders to discuss plans to end the war. On Tuesday, 11 European leaders signed a statement saying they “strongly support” Trump’s position that fighting between Russia and Ukraine should stop “immediately.”
However, Lavrov threw cold water on the idea, saying Moscow was only interested in “long-term, sustainable peace.” Zelenskyy was also hesitant to fully support stopping the war without regaining the nearly 20% of Ukraine that is under Russian control.
During last year’s presidential race, Trump suggested he could end the war on his first day in the office. He has met three times with Zelenskyy this year and once with Putin, but no peace deal has materialized.
