President Donald Trump has “no plans” to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin after Secretary of State Marco Rubio had a “productive” phone call with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, a White House official told the Daily Caller News Foundation.
Trump initially said October 16 he was poised to meet Putin at a summit in Budapest Hungary after an initial meeting between Rubio and Lavrov, which instead took place over the phone. Putin’s trip to Budapest would have been his first visit to any European Union member state since before the invasion of Ukraine, when he attended a summit in Germany on the subject of peace.
“Secretary Rubio and Foreign Minister Lavrov had a productive call. Therefore, an additional in-person meeting between the Secretary and Foreign Minister is not necessary,” the official told the DCNF.
Trump briefly met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy last Friday to discuss Ukrainian security and peace prospects with Russia. During their meeting, Zelenskyy said that he would trade thousands of Ukrainian-made drones to the U.S. in exchange for Tomahawk long-range cruise missiles.
The U.S. has been turning up the pressure on Russia to come to the peace table after initial efforts in August failed to net any measurable change. Most recently, India relented to U.S. demands to stop purchasing Russian oil.
The war front has remained relatively static since Russia failed to take Kiev in their initial attack in 2022. Ukraine has so far rejected any territorial concessions during peace negotiations.
Trump and European leaders have most recently pushed for a battlelines freeze to stop progress from either side of the conflict.
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