President Trump said he would speak to Russian President Vladimir V. Putin on Tuesday as Russia continued to express his optimism that he would agree to the proposal to halt fighting in Ukraine for 30 days.
“We want to see if we can end that war,” Trump told reporters on board the Air Force Sunday evening. “We can probably do it. We probably can't, but I think we have a very good opportunity.”
Trump said that progress in negotiations has been made over the weekend, and there has been ongoing debate about “splitting certain assets,” specifically referring to concessions over land and power plants.
“I think we're talking about land. It's a lot of land. As you know, it's a lot different than it was before the war,” Trump said.
He added: “We're talking about power plants. That's a big question. But I think a lot of things are already being discussed so much – Ukraine and Russia.”
Steve Witkoff, a US special envoy to the Middle East who has been involved in peace talks, said there was a positive meeting with Putin on CNN on Sunday, which lasted three to four hours. He refused to share details of their conversation, but he said both sides “constricted the differences between them.”
Ukraine has already agreed to support a US-backed ceasefire, and Ukrainian President Voldimi Zelensky accused Putin of deliberately delaying negotiations while trying to lock up Ukrainian troops to improve his position in the ceasefire conference.
Putin on Friday called for Ukrainian troops in Russia's surrender zones. But by the weekend, after a fierce battle, the Ukrainians had retreated from most of the region and ruled small pieces of Russian land.
