Donald Trump has insisted his administration believes Vladimir Putin is serious about seeking peace in Ukraine as European leaders accused Russia of feigning interest.
The US president’s envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner travelled to Moscow for talks on Tuesday, but the five-hour discussions ended in a stalemate.
Speaking to reporters yesterday, Trump said his aides “strongly” got the impression that Putin wanted a peace deal, describing the talks as “reasonably good”. His aides told him their impression from Putin was that “he would like to make a deal” but what happens now, however, is unclear, Trump said.
But European leaders have slammed the Russian leader as being uninterested in ending the conflict, accusing him of “wasting the world’s time.”
It comes as European Commission chiefs are planning to use frozen Russian state assets worth up to €90bn (£79bn) to lend to Kyiv for Ukraine’s struggling military as well as the country’s basic services.
Putin has warned his country is not only “ready for war” on the continent but could prosecute it with such force that there would be “nobody left to negotiate peace with” when he was finished.
