US President Donald Trump said his administration has already had “very serious” discussions with Russia about its war in Ukraine and that he and Russian President Vladimir Putin could soon take “significant” action towards ending the grinding conflict.
“We will be speaking, and I think will perhaps do something that’ll be significant,” Mr Trump said in an exchange with reporters in the Oval Office.
“We want to end that war. That war would have not started if I was president.”
Mr Trump did not say who from his administration has been in contact with the Russians but insisted the two sides were “already talking”.
Asked if he has already spoken directly with Mr Putin, Mr Trump was coy, saying: “I don’t want to say that.”
Mr Trump has said repeatedly he would not have allowed the conflict to start if he had been in office, even though he was president as fighting grew in eastern Ukraine between Kyiv’s forces and separatists backed by Moscow, ahead of Mr Putin sending in tens of thousands of troops in 2022.
Mr Trump since returning to office has criticised Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, saying he should have made a deal with Mr Putin to avoid the conflict.
In a recent interview with Russian state television, Mr Putin praised Mr Trump as a “clever and pragmatic man” who is focused on US interests.
“We always had a business-like, pragmatic but also trusting relationship with the current US president,” Mr Putin said.
“I couldn’t disagree with him that if he had been president, if they hadn’t stolen victory from him in 2020, the crisis that emerged in Ukraine in 2022 could have been avoided.”
Mr Trump in his 2024 campaign vowed to bring a quick end to the war, and repeatedly criticised President Joe Biden’s administration for spending billions in US taxpayer money on military and economic aide for Kyiv to help it fight back against Russia.
Mr Trump’s relationship with Mr Putin has been scrutinised since his 2016 campaign for president, when he called on Russia to find and make public missing emails deleted by Hillary Clinton, his Democratic opponent.
Mr Trump publicly sided with Mr Putin over US intelligence officials on whether Russia had interfered in the 2016 election to help him, and Mr Trump has praised the Russian leader and even called him “pretty smart” for invading Ukraine.
