Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy checked out the cockpit of a Gripen fighter jet in Sweden on a visit to buy 150 of the aircraft. Ukraine’s military hopes to start using some already manufactured jets next year.
Published On 22 Oct 202522 Oct 2025
Share
Gennadiy Trukhanov is alleged to have Russian citizenship, which is prohibited in Ukraine.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has stripped the mayor of Odesa, Gennadiy Trukhanov, of Ukrainian citizenship over allegations that he possesses a Russian passport.
The Ukrainian leader has instead appointed a military administration to run the country’s biggest port city on the Black Sea, with a population of about 1 million.
list of 4 itemsend of list
“The Ukrainian citizenship of the mayor of Odesa, Gennadiy Trukhanov, has been suspended,” Ukraine’s SBU security service announced on the Telegram messaging app on Tuesday, citing a decree signed by Zelenskyy.
The SBU accused the mayor of “possessing a valid international passport from the aggressor country”.
Ukraine prohibits its citizens from also holding citizenship in Russia, which launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, and the move against Trukhanov could see him deported from the country.
In a post on social media, Zelenskyy said he had held a meeting with the head of the SBU, which had reported on “countering Russian agent networks and collaborators in the front-line and border regions, as well as in the south of our country”.
The SBU chief “confirmed… the fact that certain individuals hold Russian citizenship – relevant decisions regarding them have been prepared. I have signed the decree”, Zelenskyy said.
I held a meeting on the security situation in some of our regions – these are matters of principle.
Head of the Security Service of Ukraine Vasyl Maliuk reported on countering Russian agent networks and collaborators in the frontline and border regions, as well as in the south… pic.twitter.com/MxKyKjPYc9
— Volodymyr Zelenskyy / Володимир Зеленський (@ZelenskyyUa) October 14, 2025
“Far too many security issues in Odesa have remained unanswered for far too long,” the president also said, according to reports, without providing specific details.
A former member of parliament, Trukhanov has been the mayor of Odesa since 2014. He has consistently denied accusations of holding Russian citizenship, an allegation that has dogged him throughout his political career.
“I have never received a Russian passport. I am a Ukrainian citizen,” Trukhanov stressed in a video message posted on Telegram following the announcement of his citizenship revocation.
Trukhanov said he would “continue to perform the duties of elected mayor” as long as possible and that he would take the case to court.
Images of a Russian passport allegedly belonging to Trukhanov have been shared widely on social media in Ukraine.
SBU says: pic.twitter.com/fcRe8acOgo
— Illia Ponomarenko 🇺🇦 (@IAPonomarenko) October 14, 2025
Once considered a politician with pro-Russian leanings, Trukhanov pivoted after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, and has publicly condemned Moscow while focusing on defending Odesa and aiding the Ukrainian army.
A source familiar with the matter told the Reuters news agency that Zelenskyy had also removed the Ukrainian citizenships of two other people.
Local media outlet The Kyiv Independent identified the two as Ukrainian ballet dancer Sergei Polunin, a vocal supporter of Russian President Vladimir Putin, and former Ukrainian politician and now alleged Russian collaborator Oleg Tsaryov.
Polunin, who sports a large tattoo of Putin on his chest, was born in southern Ukraine but obtained Russian citizenship in 2018. He supported Russia’s 2022 invasion and, earlier in 2014, backed Russia’s annexation of Crimea, where he lived and worked.
In July, Zelenskyy revoked the citizenship of Metropolitan Onufriy, the head of the formerly Moscow-linked Ukrainian Orthodox Church.
Kyiv has announced that it is sending a delegation to Washington for talks on strengthening its defence and energy resilience as Russian forces continue targeting Ukraine’s power infrastructure ahead of the cold winter months.
The departure of a senior delegation, led by Prime Minister Yulia Svyrydenko, was announced on Monday, just as Ukraine’s Energy Ministry said it had imposed power outages across the country in a bid to reduce pressure on the grid in the wake of damaging Russian attacks.
list of 4 itemsend of list
Meanwhile, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on Monday that he would meet with his US counterpart, President Donald Trump, in Washington on Friday to discuss Ukraine’s air defence and long-range strike capabilities.
Speaking to reporters in Kyiv, Zelenskyy said that he had shared with Trump a “vision” of how many US Tomahawk missiles Ukraine needs for its war effort against Russia and that the two leaders would further discuss the matter on Friday.
The comments came after recent remarks by Trump that he might consider giving Ukraine long-range precision strike Tomahawk missiles if Russia did not end the war soon, and as Zelenskyy has urged Trump to turn his attention to ending his country’s war with Russia, after having brokered a deal in Gaza.
The renewed talk of escalating pressure on Moscow comes in the wake of intensified Russian attacks on Ukraine’s energy facilities, prompting Ukraine’s Energy Ministry to announce that it was introducing restrictions across seven regions in an effort to reduce pressure on the damaged grid and preserve supply.
For the past three years, Russia has targeted Ukraine’s energy infrastructure in a bid to demoralise the population, leaving millions without power amid brutally cold conditions.
“Due to the complicated situation in Ukraine’s Unified Energy System caused by previous Russian strikes, emergency power outages were implemented” across seven regions, the energy ministry said in a post on Telegram.
It listed territories mainly in the centre and east of the country, including the Donetsk region, where officials have encouraged civilians to leave due to the targeted attacks on power facilities.
“The emergency power cuts will be cancelled once the situation in the power grid has stabilised,” the statement said.
The escalating attacks left more than a million households and businesses temporarily without power in nine regions on Friday, while overnight attacks on Saturday night left two employees of Ukraine’s largest private energy company wounded.
“Russia has … made its attacks on our energy more vicious – to compensate for their failure on the ground,” Zelenskyy said on Sunday.
In response to the attacks, Zelenskyy’s Chief of Staff Andriy Yermak said on Monday that a delegation, including Svyrydenko and National Security and Defence Council Secretary Rustem Umerov, had left for talks in Washington.
“We’re heading for high-level talks to strengthen Ukraine’s defence, secure our energy resilience, and intensify sanctions pressure on the aggressor,” he posted on X.
“The ultimate goal remains unchanged – a just and lasting peace.”
The delegation came after Zelenskyy said on Sunday that he had spoken to Trump for the second time in two days, in discussions that covered “defence of life in our country” and “strengthening our capabilities – in air defence, resilience, and long-range capabilities”.
“We also discussed many details related to the energy sector. President Trump is well informed about everything that is happening,” he said, adding that their respective teams were preparing for the talks.
Following the conversation, Trump told reporters on board his flight to Israel that he might consider giving Ukraine long-range precision strike Tomahawk missiles if Russia did not end the war soon.
“They’d like to have Tomahawks. That’s a step up,” Trump said, referring to the Ukrainians.
“The Tomahawk is an incredible weapon, very offensive weapon. And honestly, Russia does not need that,” Trump added.
On Monday, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov responded to the suggestion that Washington could provide the missiles to Kyiv by saying such a move could have serious consequences.
Russian Security Council Deputy Chairman Dmitry Medvedev went even further, warning Trump on Monday that supplying Tomahawks to Ukraine could “end badly” for him.
Moscow has long expressed its concern over the prospect of advanced weapons transfers to Ukraine, saying such deliveries would entail direct US involvement in the conflict.
The Kremlin has warned of the risk of escalation if Kyiv is provided with the US-built long-range missiles.
Published On 12 Oct 202512 Oct 2025
Share
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said his country would only use long-range Tomahawk missiles against Russian military targets, as the Kremlin expressed alarm over Washington’s potential plan to offer the weapons to Kyiv.
Zelenskyy’s comment was aired by Fox News on Sunday, the same day he spoke to US President Donald Trump.
list of 3 itemsend of list
Writing on X, the Ukrainian president called his latest conversation with Trump “very productive”, noting that they had discussed strengthening his country’s “air defence, resilience, and long-range capabilities”. It was the second time the pair had spoken in as many days.
On Monday, Trump said he would only agree to provide Kyiv with Tomahawks if he knew what it planned to do with them. He added, without giving further details, that he had “sort of made a decision” over the issue.
Given that their range is 2,500km (1,550 miles), Ukraine could use the weapons to strike deep inside Russia.
In comments published on Sunday, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said the topic was of “extreme concern” to Russia.
“Now is really a very dramatic moment in terms of the fact that tensions are escalating from all sides,” he told Russian state television reporter Pavel Zarubin.
Peskov said Moscow would have to bear in mind that some versions of the missile are able to carry nuclear warheads.
The Kremlin spokesperson’s remarks came as French President Emmanuel Macron condemned the latest Russian strikes on Ukraine’s energy infrastructure.
After speaking with Zelenskyy on Sunday, Macron said: “As the agreement reached in Gaza offers a glimmer of hope for peace in the Middle East, the war in Ukraine too must come to an end.”
“If Russia persists in its obstinate warmongering and its refusal to come to the negotiating table, it will have to pay the price,” he said.
Meanwhile, Zelenskyy said in a Facebook post that he had urged Macron to give Ukraine more missiles and air defence systems, stressing that Russia was increasing its bombardments while the world’s focus was elsewhere.
“Russia is now taking advantage of the moment — the fact that the Middle East and domestic issues in every country are getting maximum attention,” Zelensky said in a readout of his call with Macron.
As it has done before, Russia is targeting Ukrainian energy infrastructure in an attempt to cripple the sector before winter.
In the past week alone, Russia has launched “more than 3,100 drones, 92 missiles, and around 1,360 glide bombs” at Ukraine, according to Zelenskyy.
Two employees of Ukraine’s largest private energy company, DTEK, were injured at a substation in Kyiv province in overnight attacks on Sunday, according to the regional governor.
On Friday, Russia carried out what Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Svyrydenko described as “one of the largest concentrated strikes” against Ukraine’s energy infrastructure, leading to blackouts across the country.
Ukraine’s president praises Trump’s efforts to secure Gaza ceasefire, says other wars ‘can be stopped as well’.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has urged Donald Trump to broker peace in Ukraine like in “the Middle East” during a phone call, saying if the United States president could stop one war, “others can be stopped as well.”
Saturday’s call came a day after Russia launched a large-scale attack on Ukraine’s energy grid, knocking out power to parts of the capital, Kyiv, and nine other Ukrainian regions, which have since been restored.
list of 3 itemsend of list
Diplomatic efforts to end Russia’s invasion of Ukraine have slowed in recent weeks, in part because global attention has shifted to brokering a ceasefire in Israel’s war on Gaza, Kyiv said.
Trump, who announced the first phase of a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas on Wednesday, met Russian President Vladimir Putin for talks in August but failed to secure progress on a ceasefire in the European war.
“I had a call with US President Donald Trump. A very positive and productive one,” Zelenskyy said on Facebook, congratulating Trump for his “outstanding” ceasefire plan in the Middle East.
“If a war can be stopped in one region, then surely other wars can be stopped as well, including the Russian war,” Zelenskyy added, calling for Trump to pressure the Kremlin into negotiations.
Relations between the two leaders have warmed dramatically since February when they sparred during a televised meeting at the White House.
Trump has since grown more hostile towards Moscow while expressing sympathy for Ukraine.
In September, he wrote on Truth Social that Kyiv should try to “take back” all its occupied territory with Europe’s and NATO’s help.
US first lady Melania Trump said on Friday that she had secured the release of Ukrainian children abducted by Russia after establishing an extraordinary back channel of communication with Putin.
Russian attacks on Ukraine killed at least five people on Saturday and cut power to parts of southern Ukraine’s Odesa region, according to Ukrainian officials.
Two of the people died inside a church in Kostyantynivka when it was hit by a strike, according to local authorities.
Ukraine’s largest private energy company, DTEK, said “the main work to restore the power supply” was completed but some localised outages were still affecting the Ukrainian capital after Friday’s “massive” Russian attacks.
Ukrainian drone attacks, meanwhile, killed two people in Russia, according to regional officials.
In the Russian border region of Belgorod, a truck driver was killed by a Ukrainian strike, according to local officials.
Moscow has targeted Ukraine’s energy grid each winter since it launched its full-scale invasion in 2022, cutting power and heating to millions of households and disrupting water supplies in what Kyiv says is a brazen war crime.
Russia denies targeting civilians and says Ukraine uses the energy sites to power its military sector.
Both countries have accused each other in recent months of frustrating progress towards a peace deal.
Russia blames Kyiv and its European allies for the impasse, accusing them of undermining peace negotiations with Washington. Ukraine and Europe accuse Russia of playing for time so it can seize more Ukrainian territory.
Zelenskyy said in his nightly address on Friday that Russia was taking advantage of the world being “almost entirely focused on the prospect of establishing peace in the Middle East” and called for strengthening Ukraine’s air defence systems and placing tighter sanctions on Russia.
“Russian assets must be fully used to strengthen our defence and ensure recovery,” he said in the video, posted to X.
Pressing for stiffened sanctions, president says more than 100,000 components from US, UK and other suppliers found in Russian missiles and drones fired on Ukraine.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has alleged that drones and missiles fired by Russia against his country are filled with parts sourced from Western companies.
In a social media post on Monday, Zelenskyy said the hundreds of weapons used in Russian attacks over the previous two nights contained tens of thousands of components produced by firms in the United States, United Kingdom, Germany, Switzerland, Japan, South Korea, the Netherlands, Taiwan and China.
list of 3 itemsend of list
“Nearly 100,688 of foreign-made parts were in the launched attack drones, about 1,500 were in Iskanders, 192 in Kinzhal missiles, and 405 in Kalibrs,” he wrote.
He made the accusation as Ukraine and some European partners are pressing for harsher sanctions and stronger oversight to close loopholes on current trade limits imposed in the wake of Russia’s invasion of its neighbouring country in February 2022.
Zelenskyy’s inclusion of US and UK companies was noteworthy due to the leading role the two countries have had in mobilising military and financial support for Ukraine as it battles Russia’s invading forces.
US companies manufacture converters for Kh-101 missiles and Shahed-type drones, sensors for unmanned aerial vehicles and Kinzhal missiles, and microelectronics for missiles, the Ukrainian president said. He added that British companies produce microcomputers for drone flight control.
“Ukraine is preparing new sanctions against those who help Russia and its war,” Zelenskyy said, adding that detailed data on each company and product have been shared with Ukraine’s partners.
Zelenskyy, who has long called on countries around the world to prevent the funding and equipping of Russia’s war machine, demanded more robust measures before a meeting of G7 sanctions coordinators, a body that oversees sanctions regimes among the club of the world’s wealthiest countries.
Oleh Alexandrov, a Ukrainian intelligence official, said over the weekend that Kyiv has evidence that China has been helping Moscow identify targets in Ukraine. He said there was “evidence of a high level of cooperation between Russia and China in conducting satellite reconnaissance of the territory of Ukraine in order to identify and further explore strategic objects for targeting”.
Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov denied reliance on China’s satellites and said Russia has its “own capabilities, including space capabilities, to accomplish all the tasks the special military operation poses”.
Zelenskyy issued his statement as a number of European countries have been dealing with a wave of suspicious drone activity.
Unmanned aerial vehicles have been spotted over military sites and disrupted air traffic. Some governments have pointed a finger at Russia and warned that Moscow is testing NATO’s air defences.
Russia has denied responsibility, and President Vladimir Putin has mocked countries accusing Moscow of being behind the drone incursions.
On Monday, the Kremlin dismissed as “baseless” comments by German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, who said his country assumes Russia was behind the activity.
Oslo Airport, meanwhile, temporarily suspended several landings on Monday after reports of a drone, its operator, Avinor, said.
Ukrainian leader says the plant has been without power for seven days, the longest stretch since Russia’s 2022 full-scale invasion.
Published On 30 Sep 202530 Sep 2025
Share
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has warned that the situation at the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant is “critical” as the facility has been without power for seven days.
“It has been seven days now. There has never been anything like this before,” Zelenskyy said in his nightly address on Tuesday.
list of 3 itemsend of list
One of the diesel generators providing emergency power to the plant is no longer working, Zelenskyy said, a week after external power lines went down.
“Russian shelling has cut the plant off from the electricity network,” the Ukrainian leader said.
“This is a threat to everyone. No terrorist in the world has ever dared to do with a nuclear power plant what Russia is doing now.”
The outage is the longest the Russian-occupied plant has gone without power since Moscow’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
It is also the 10th time since the start of the war that the plant – the largest in Europe – has been disconnected from the power grid.
Russia seized control of Zaporizhzhia in the first weeks of the war, and the plant’s six reactors, which before the conflict produced about one-fifth of Ukraine’s electricity, were shut down after Moscow took over.
But the plant needs power to maintain cooling and safety systems, which prevent reactors from melting – a danger that could set off a nuclear incident.
Russian officials have not commented on the latest statements on conditions at the plant.
But Moscow and Kyiv have repeatedly accused each other of risking a potentially devastating nuclear disaster by attacking the site, and have traded blame over the latest blackout.
Rafael Grossi, the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the United Nations’s nuclear watchdog, earlier this week decried the cutoff of the external power lines but assigned no blame to either side.
In a statement on Tuesday, Grossi said he was engaging with officials from both countries to restore offsite power to Zaporizhzhia as soon as possible.
“I’m in constant contact with the two sides with the aim to enable the plant’s swift re-connection to the electricity grid,” the IAEA chief said.
“While the plant is currently coping thanks to its emergency diesel generators – the last line of defence – and there is no immediate danger as long as they keep working, it is clearly not a sustainable situation in terms of nuclear safety,” he added.
“Neither side would benefit from a nuclear accident.”
IAEA monitors are stationed permanently at Zaporizhzhia and at Ukraine’s three other nuclear power stations.
The IAEA is engaging with both sides of the military conflict to help pave the way for the restoration of offsite power to Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhya NPP as soon as possible, Director General @rafaelmgrossi said today: https://t.co/ODSjkR6fXd pic.twitter.com/SbWEh7TBCq
— IAEA – International Atomic Energy Agency ⚛️ (@iaeaorg) September 30, 2025
Kyiv in sanctions push as NATO states on Europe’s eastern flank take preventive action after Moscow’s air incursions.
Published On 20 Sep 202520 Sep 2025
Share
Ukrainian Volodymyr Zelenskyy is preparing to meet US President Donald Trump on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly in New York City next week in a bid to urge him to impose stronger sanctions on Russia.
The Ukrainian president shared his plans on Saturday, as Russia intensified attacks on his country following air incursions into Europe’s eastern flank that have sparked anxiety over a potential spillover of the ongoing war in Ukraine.
list of 3 itemsend of list
The announcement, reported by the AFP news agency, came the day after the European Union presented its 19th sanctions package.
“We now expect strong sanctions steps from the United States as well – Europe is doing its part,” Zelenskyy posted on X on Saturday.
This week brought us closer to finalizing the 19th sanctions package – we expect its approval soon. We will quickly synchronize the package in Ukraine. Russia’s energy resources are being restricted. The infrastructure of the “shadow fleet” will face new pressure. Cryptocurrency… pic.twitter.com/JzgvsQQHHQ
— Volodymyr Zelenskyy / Володимир Зеленський (@ZelenskyyUa) September 20, 2025
Trump already signalled last week that he was ready to impose “major sanctions” on Russia, which has so far evaded his attempts for a ceasefire, but only if all NATO allies agree to completely halt buying oil from Moscow.
Zelenskyy is also expected to discuss security guarantees for Ukraine to prevent future Russian attacks after an eventual truce, though Russian President Vladimir Putin has warned that he would not accept the presence of Western troops in Ukraine.
Moscow stepped up attacks on Ukraine overnight, firing 40 missiles and some 580 drones in one of the biggest barrages of Russia’s war on its neighbour, killing at least three people and wounding dozens.
NATO countries took measures to strengthen defences on Europe’s eastern flank after Russian drone incursions in Poland and Romania over the past two weeks, and unprecedented reports of three Russian fighter jets entering Estonian airspace on Friday.
Poland’s army said that Polish and allied aircraft were deployed early on Saturday in a “preventative operation” to ensure the safety of Polish airspace after Russia launched air strikes targeting western Ukraine, near the Polish border.
The United Kingdom said that its fighter jets had flown their first NATO air defence sortie to patrol Polish skies and defend against potential aerial threats from Russia as part of the alliance’s Eastern Sentry mission.
On Saturday, Russia’s Ministry of Defence denied that its aircraft flew into Estonia’s airspace the day before, but Estonian officials said the 12-minute violation was confirmed by radar and visual contact.
Colonel Ants Kiviselg, the commander of Estonia’s Military Intelligence Centre, said that it still “needs to be confirmed” whether the border violation was deliberate.
Baltic and Nordic leaders in Denmark’s Copenhagen are meeting Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who is on a diplomatic drive trying to cement security guarantees for Kyiv in the event of a peace deal to end Russia’s war in Ukraine.
“The heads of state and government will discuss how the Nordic-Baltic countries can ensure further support for Ukraine on the frontline and in the negotiating room,” Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen’s office said in a statement on Wednesday.
The gathering brings together the leaders of the Nordic-Baltic Eight (NB8) – Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Iceland, Latvia, Lithuania, Norway and Sweden – with Zelenskyy to discuss Ukraine’s future.
Finnish President Alexander Stubb said on Tuesday that progress was being made on security guarantees for Ukraine, but he stressed that such measures would only be implemented after a peace agreement is reached.
“We need to coordinate the security arrangements with the United States, which essentially will provide the backstop for this … We’re focusing on these issues with our chiefs of defence, which are drawing the concrete plans of what this type of operation might look like,” Stubb told reporters.
“We’re making progress on this and hopefully we’ll get a solution soon,” he said, while cautioning that he was not optimistic about a ceasefire or peace agreement with Russia in the near term.
NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte said he expected clarity at a summit of Ukraine’s allies on Thursday “or soon after” on what security guarantees Europe can offer Kyiv once the war halts.
“I expect tomorrow, or soon after tomorrow, to have clarity on what collectively we can deliver,” Rutte said at a news conference with Estonian President Alar Karis in Brussels. “That means that we can engage even more intensely, also with the American side, to see what they want to deliver in terms of their participation in security guarantees.”
United Kingdom Prime Minister Keir Starmer and French President Emmanuel Macron will co-host Thursday’s mostly virtual meeting of leaders of the so-called “coalition of the willing” – a collection of Western states working on long-term guarantees for Ukraine, and NATO. Zelenskyy moves on to meet Macron tonight in Paris ahead of that summit.
Western officials have said such guarantees are aimed at deterring Russia from launching another war after hostilities end, whether through a ceasefire or a permanent peace deal.
They are expected to centre on continued military support for Kyiv, along with an international force to reassure Ukraine. However, European leaders have made clear that such a force would only be feasible with US participation.
United States President Donald Trump last month promised American involvement, but Washington has yet to spell out what it would contribute. Rutte sought to reassure eastern NATO members that resources for Ukraine’s security guarantees would not come at the expense of the alliance’s own defences.
“We have to prevent spreading our resources too thinly, and this means that we always have to look at what the impact will be on the NATO plans,” he said.
Moscow, meanwhile, rejects the idea of European peacekeeping troops on the ground in Ukraine, and insists that any future settlement must reflect what it calls “new territorial realities”.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov told Indonesia’s Kompas newspaper that regions annexed by Russia – Crimea, Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhia and Kherson – must be “recognized and formalized in an international legal manner” for peace to last.
Trump has suggested any eventual deal would involve Ukraine ceding some territory, but many analysts believe one of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s core demands will be Ukrainian recognition of Moscow’s control over the parts of Donbas still under Kyiv’s authority.
Zelenskyy has repeatedly rejected such concessions, warning that losing any territory would embolden Russia to launch new attacks in the future. The Ukrainian constitution also forbids it.
As diplomacy continues behind the scenes, Russia’s assault continues to intensify across eastern Ukraine. Its forces claim to have encircled and now captured “about half” of Kupiansk, a strategic city in the northeastern Kharkiv region. Moscow’s Ministry of Defence also claimed its forces had seized the settlement of Fedorivka in Donetsk.
In the skies, Russia launched a sweeping overnight air campaign, striking targets across nine regions. Ukrainian officials said at least four railway workers were injured, while Poland scrambled defence aircraft as explosions echoed near its border.
Ukraine’s emergency services reported that five people were injured and 28 homes damaged in an attack on the Znamianka community in the Kirovohrad region. In Khmelnytskyi, transport services faced “significant schedule disruptions” after strikes damaged residential buildings and triggered fires.
Local authorities said two people were killed in Russian shelling of Polohivskyi district in Zaporizhia, while separate attacks caused deaths in Kherson, Kyiv region and Donetsk. The independent news outlet Kyiv Independent reported at least five civilians killed across the country in the latest wave of strikes.
Russia said it had shot down 158 Ukrainian drones in the past 24 hours, while claiming that Ukrainian attacks across its border killed 12 people and wounded nearly 100 in the past week. In the Belgorod region, Governor Vyacheslav Gladkov said a Ukrainian drone strike injured three people in the village of Proletarsky.
The diplomatic manoeuvring comes as Putin seeks to deepen ties with North Korea and China. His meeting on Wednesday with Kim Jong Un in Beijing, alongside Chinese President Xi Jinping at a grand military parade, underscored the growing partnership between Moscow and Pyongyang.
Trump responded by accusing the three leaders of conspiring against the United States – a claim dismissed by the Kremlin.
The announcement came hours after overnight Russian strikes on energy sites left 60,000 Ukrainians without electricity.
Published On 31 Aug 202531 Aug 2025
Ukraine intends to strike deep into Russia following a large Russian drone attack that left 60,000 Ukrainians without electricity, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said.
Speaking on Sunday after a meeting with his top general, Oleksandr Syrskii, the Ukrainian president confirmed the new planned strikes on X.
Both sides have intensified their air strikes in recent weeks, with Moscow attacking Ukraine’s energy and transport systems as well as launching deadly strikes in recent days on civilian areas in Kyiv and Zaporizhia, and Ukraine targeting Russian oil refineries and pipelines.
Overnight, Russian drones hit four energy facilities in Ukraine’s Odesa region, according to the private energy company DTEK. The strikes left 29,000 people without electricity, local authorities reported.
The port city of Chornomorsk near Odesa, where one person was injured, was the worst-affected place, regional Governor Oleh Kiper wrote on Telegram. “Critical infrastructure is operating on generators,” he said.
DTEK said emergency repair work would start following the all-clear from the Ukrainian military, which reported that in total, Russia had attacked Ukraine with 142 drones, all but 10 of which it claimed to have downed.
The Russian military suggested on Sunday that it had shot down 112 Ukrainian drones in the past 24 hours.
Meanwhile, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov blamed Europe for the continuation of the war and for hampering United States President Donald Trump’s peace efforts.
“The European warring party is maintaining its fundamental course; it is not giving in,” he said from the sidelines of a summit in China, in a reference to the European Union’s arms deliveries to Ukraine.
His words came just days after a Russian air strike killed at least 23 people and damaged EU diplomatic offices in central Kyiv.
Speaking just hours before Trump’s deadline for Russian President Vladimir Putin to agree to a meeting with his Ukrainian counterpart Zelenskyy, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said he thought the war, which began more than three and a half years ago, would not finish soon.
“I am preparing myself inwardly for this war to last a long time,” he told the public broadcaster ZDF on Sunday, noting that diplomatic efforts to bring the conflict to an end could not come “at the price of Ukraine’s capitulation”.
Elsewhere, Ursula von der Leyen, the president of the European Commission, travelled to Poland on Sunday as part of her tour of EU states that border Russia and its ally Belarus.
Speaking alongside the Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk, von der Leyen called Putin a “predator” who could only be kept in check through “strong deterrence”.
The EU Commission president also said that member states bordering Russia and Belarus would receive additional funding from the bloc, calling the defence of its borders a “shared responsibility”.
While the EU continues to highlight Russia’s security risk for the wider continent, the Kremlin has sought to embellish its military achievements in a bid to make its victory in Ukraine seem inevitable, according to the Institute for the Study of War (ISW), a US think tank.
In its latest assessment of the conflict, ISW said that Russian army chief General Valery Gerasimov’s claims on Saturday about Russian gains were exaggerated.
The Russian general had suggested that the Kremlin’s forces had captured 3,500sq km [1,351sq miles] of territory and 149 settlements since the start of March.
“Gerasimov’s claims notably inflate Russian gains by roughly 1,200 square kilometres [463sq miles] and 19 settlements,” the ISW said.
Ukrainian leader calls for wider international support to get Russia to negotiating table amid faltering peace efforts.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has called on countries in the Global South to support diplomatic efforts to push Russia to agree to end its war with Ukraine.
In a social media post following talks with his South African counterpart Cyril Ramaphosa on Saturday, Zelenskyy stressed that the conflict “must be brought to an end” and that “the killings and destruction must be stopped”.
“I reaffirmed my readiness for any format of meeting with the head of Russia,” the Ukrainian leader said, referring to Russian President Vladimir Putin.
“However, we see that Moscow is once again trying to drag everything out even further. It is important that the Global South sends relevant signals and pushes Russia toward peace.”
The comments come as a renewed diplomatic effort, spearheaded by United States President Donald Trump with support from European countries, to push Moscow to end its war in Ukraine has appeared to stall.
On Friday, Trump expressed frustration with Moscow over the lack of progress in efforts to negotiate a peaceful settlement to end the war, despite his recent meeting with Putin in Alaska.
The US president renewed a threat that he would consider imposing sanctions on Russia if there was no momentum within the next two weeks.
Trump has been trying to arrange a summit between Putin and Zelenskyy, which has long been sought by the Ukrainian leader, to discuss an end to the war.
But on Friday, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said there were no plans for such a meeting.
Lavrov said in an interview with NBC’s “Meet the Press” programme that Putin had made clear he was ready to meet Zelenskyy, provided there was a proper agenda for such a session, something the Russian foreign minister said was lacking for now.
“Putin is ready to meet with Zelenskyy when the agenda would be ready for a summit. And this agenda is not ready at all,” Lavrov said.
Amid the push for a diplomatic resolution, fighting has continued to grind on the battlefield.
Russia’s Ministry of Defence said in a statement on Telegram on Saturday that its forces in eastern Ukraine had taken two villages in the Donetsk region, Sredneye and Kleban-Byk.
That followed the capture of three other villages in the region a day earlier.
The capture of Kleban-Byk would represent further progress towards Kostiantynivka – a key town on the road to Kramatorsk, where a major Ukrainian logistics base is located.
The Ukrainian president said China has helped Russia, despite also calling for a peaceful resolution to the war.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has ruled out the chance that China could serve as a security guarantor in the event of a future peace deal with Russia to end the war in Ukraine.
The Ukrainian president’s remarks follow discussions this week between United States and European leaders about how to establish a future peacekeeping force in Ukraine should the war end.
“Why is China not in the guarantees? First, China did not help us stop this war from the beginning,” Zelenskyy told reporters, according to a report by The Kyiv Post media outlet on Thursday.
“Secondly, China helped Russia by opening the drone market,” Zelenskyy said.
Beijing has repeatedly called for a peaceful resolution to the Ukraine war, but its ongoing economic support for Russia has undermined its neutral image with Zelenskyy and Western leaders.
Despite Beijing’s ambitions of playing a greater role in mediating international conflicts, the Ukrainian leader’s remarks suggest that China will have no role in a Russia-Ukraine peace process.
Zelenskyy has said that international security guarantors are needed to ensure that Russia does not resume its attacks on Ukraine after signing a peace deal, and those participating should only be drawn from countries that have supported Kyiv since the Russian invasion in 2022.
In April, Zelenskyy accused China of supplying Russia with weapons and assisting in arms production, in the first direct accusation of its kind from the Ukrainian president.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mao Ning denied the claims and called them “groundless” and “political manipulation”.
Beijing was previously accused by the US of supplying Russia’s military with essential components to build missiles, tanks, aircraft, and other weapons.
China has said previously it only traded in “dual-use components” – those that can be used for both civilian and military purposes.
Questions about Beijing’s role in the war, however, have persisted for years due to the close relationship between the Russian and Chinese leaders, Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping.
Just weeks before the invasion of Ukraine, Putin visited Xi in Beijing and signed a “no limits partnership” between both countries.
Since then, China has helped keep Russia’s economy afloat in spite of sweeping international sanctions.
The EU and the US have both accused China of helping Russia to evade sanctions and continue to trade with Moscow in energy, electronics, chemicals and transportation components, according to the Center for European Policy Analysis.
Donald Trump says he’s arranging a summit between Vladimir Putin and Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy returned to the White House for a much-anticipated meeting with United States President Donald Trump on Monday.
His last trip earlier this year was widely considered a failure, as it was dominated by a tense public berating from Trump.
But on this trip, he had considerable backup – from world leaders including French President Emmanuel Macron, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer, and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen.
They got what they went for – a security guarantee, for Ukraine, from Washington.
The next step is a meeting between Zelenskyy and Russian President Vladimir Putin in the hopes of signing a long-term peace agreement.
But what would be the terms?
Presenter: Mohammed Jamjoom
Guests:
Maria Mezentseva – Member of Ukraine’s parliament and head of the Ukrainian delegation to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe
Jim Townsend – Adjunct senior fellow in the Transatlantic Security Program at the Center for a New American Security
Pavel Felgenhauer – Russian defence and foreign policy analyst
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and top European leaders met with United States President Donald Trump at the White House on Monday to discuss plans to bring an end to Russia’s war in Ukraine.
Trump convened the meeting after last week’s three-hour summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Alaska, where Putin rejected the idea of a ceasefire before reaching a comprehensive peace deal and urged Ukraine to surrender territory in the east in exchange for freezing the front line elsewhere.
Trump and Zelenskyy’s interactions were notably warmer than during their tense encounter at the White House in February, with the US president even praising his counterpart’s suit.
Here are the key takeaways:
Trump said the US would back Europe in protecting Ukraine as part of a deal to end the war with Russia.
“When it comes to security, there’s going to be a lot of help,” Trump said, describing European countries as the “first line of defence”.
“We have people waiting in another room, right now, they’re all here from Europe,” Trump added. “Biggest people in Europe. And they want to give protection. They feel very strongly about it, and we’ll help them out with that.”
Trump also said that US support for Ukraine would continue regardless of the outcome of the talks.
“It’s never the end of the road. People are being killed, and we want to stop that. So, I would not say it was the end of the road. I think we have a good chance of doing it,” he said.
Zelenskyy hailed the pledge as “a major step forward”.
He later told reporters that Ukraine had offered to buy about $90bn worth of US weapons.
Zelenskyy backed elections, provided they are held under safe circumstances.
“Yes, of course. We are open, yes… We need to work in the parliament because during the war, you can’t have elections, but we can, we can do security,” Zelenskyy said.
“We need a truce… to make it possible for people to do democratic, open, legal, legal elections,” he added.
When asked if he would carry out his promise from last week to impose “severe consequences” on Russia if it does not end the war, Trump replied that a ceasefire may not be needed.
“I don’t think you need a ceasefire,” Trump said.
“You know, if you look at the six deals that I settled this year, they were all at war. I didn’t do any ceasefires. And I know that it might be good to have, but I can also understand strategically why one country or the other wouldn’t want it,” he said.
“But we can work a deal where we’re working on a peace deal while they’re fighting,” Trump added.
“They have to fight. I wish they could stop.”
Trump has claimed credit for helping to end six wars, including conflicts between India and Pakistan and Cambodia and Thailand.
Asked what guarantees Zelenskyy would need from Trump to agree to a deal, the Ukrainian leader responded: “everything”.
“It includes two parts. First, a strong Ukrainian army that I began to discuss with your colleagues, and it’s a lot about weapons and people and training issues and intelligence,” Zelenskyy said.
Today, important negotiations took place in Washington. We discussed many issues with President Trump. It was a long and detailed conversation, including discussions about the situation on the battlefield and our steps to bring peace closer. There were also several meetings in a… pic.twitter.com/YqkdRlyKCI
— Volodymyr Zelenskyy / Володимир Зеленський (@ZelenskyyUa) August 19, 2025
After his initial meeting with Zelenskyy, Trump held a multilateral meeting with the Ukrainian leader and European leaders, including European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, French President Emmanuel Macron and UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer.
The US president described it as an “honour” to convene with them at the White House, saying they were united in their goal of ending Russia’s war in Ukraine.
“We’ve had a very successful day thus far, and important discussions as we work to end the killing and stop the war in Ukraine,” Trump said.
President Trump and President Zelenskyy en route to meet with the European leaders pic.twitter.com/EHvttm7nDl
— Margo Martin (@MargoMartin47) August 18, 2025
“At the conclusion of the meetings, I called President Putin and began the arrangements for a meeting, at a location to be determined, between President Putin and President Zelenskyy,” he wrote in a post on Truth Social after the talks.
“This is one of the key points that we need to consider, and we’re going to be considering that at the table,” Trump said.
He expressed optimism that, collectively, an agreement could be reached to deter further aggression against Ukraine.
Trump also said discussions would need to address the possible exchange of territory.
“Ultimately, this is a decision that can only be made by President Zelenskyy and by the people of Ukraine, working also in agreement with President Putin,” Trump said.
Russia controls about one-fifth of Ukraine, according to open-source estimates. Ukraine, which took control of a large swath of Russia’s Kursk region during a surprise counter-offensive last year, is not believed to hold any Russian territory at present.
Trump added that he expected Putin to release Ukrainian prisoners soon.
Everybody around this table is in favor of peace. pic.twitter.com/F7wYi8MQ8M
— Emmanuel Macron (@EmmanuelMacron) August 18, 2025
European Council leaders will hold a video call tomorrow to review Monday’s talks, President Antonio Costa said.
In a post on X, Costa said the call would take place at 1pm Brussels time (11:00 GMT) on Tuesday.
US President Donald Trump talked down the need for a ceasefire to end the Ukraine war as he greeted Volodymyr Zelenskyy at the White House. Trump also hinted at a 3-way telephone call with Vladimir Putin and Zelenskyy after Monday’s meetings.
Published On 18 Aug 202518 Aug 2025
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy revealed key details of his private White House meeting with Donald Trump, saying they discussed US security guarantees, prisoner exchanges, and a trilateral meeting with Russia’s Vladimir Putin.
Published On 18 Aug 202518 Aug 2025
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has arrived at the White House for a crucial meeting with Donald Trump and European leaders to discuss ways to end the war in Ukraine. The US president already met with Russia’s Vladimir Putin for a one-on-one discussion last week.
Published On 18 Aug 202518 Aug 2025
United States President Donald Trump has increased pressure on Ukraine to accept an agreement to end Russia’s war, claiming that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy could choose to end the conflict “almost immediately”.
Addressing Zelenskyy a day before his high-stakes visit to the White House on Monday, Trump warned that the return of Russian-occupied Crimea and Ukrainian membership of NATO would be off the table in any negotiated settlement.
“President Zelenskyy of Ukraine can end the war with Russia almost immediately, if he wants to, or he can continue to fight,” Trump said on his Truth Social platform on Sunday.
“Remember how it started. No getting back Obama given Crimea (12 years ago, without a shot being fired!), and NO GOING INTO NATO BY UKRAINE. Some things never change!!!”
Trump’s comments came as European leaders were set to accompany Zelenskyy on his visit to Washington, DC, on Monday amid concerns in Brussels and Kyiv that the US president could sign off on a deal that is overly favourable to Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Speaking shortly after Trump’s comments on Sunday, Zelenskyy said that previous concessions to Moscow, including in Crimea, had only emboldened Putin to wage more war.
“We all share a strong desire to end this war quickly and reliably. And peace must be lasting,” Zelenskyy said in a post on X.
“Not like it was years ago, when Ukraine was forced to give up Crimea and part of our East – part of Donbas – and Putin simply used it as a springboard for a new attack. Or when Ukraine was given so called ‘security guarantees’ in 1994, but they didn’t work.”
Zelenskyy added that Crimea “should not have been given up then, just as Ukrainians did not give up Kyiv, Odesa, or Kharkiv after 2022”.
“Ukrainians are fighting for their land, for their independence,” he said.
While Trump has indicated that a deal with Moscow would involve “some swapping, changes in land” between Russia and Ukraine, Zelenskyy has repeatedly ruled out handing over Ukrainian territory to “the occupier”.
In a bid to press Trump to maintain support for Ukraine, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, French President Emmanuel Macron, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte, Finnish President Alexander Stubb, and Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni are attending Monday’s talks at the White House.
Macron said on Sunday that European leaders and Zelenskyy would aim to present a united front in the face of Russian aggression.
“If we show weakness today in front of Russia, we are laying the ground for future conflicts,” Macron said.
Despite Trump dismissing the possibility of Ukraine joining NATO, US special envoy Steve Witkoff said earlier on Sunday that Putin had agreed to support a US-backed security guarantee resembling the 32-member transatlantic alliance’s collective defence mandate during last week’s meeting with the US president in Alaska.
“We were able to win the following concession: That the United States could offer Article 5-like protection, which is one of the real reasons why Ukraine wants to be in NATO,” Witkoff told CNN’s State of the Union.
Under Article 5, an armed attack against a NATO member nation is considered an attack against all members of the alliance.
Still, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Sunday sought to temper expectations, saying an agreement to end the war was “a long ways off”.
“We’re not at the precipice of a peace agreement,” Rubio told ABC News’s This Week.
“We made progress in the sense that we identified potential areas of agreement, but there remain some big areas of disagreement.”
European leaders will join Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy during his visit to Washington, DC, seeking an end to the Russia-Ukraine war, after United States President Donald Trump dropped both his push for a ceasefire and the threat of punitive actions against Russia following his Alaska summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Securing a ceasefire in Ukraine, more than three years after Russia’s invasion, had been one of Trump’s core demands before Friday’s Alaska summit, to which Ukraine and its European allies were not invited.
Special US envoy Steve Witkoff said on Sunday that Putin agreed at the summit with Trump to allow the US and European allies to offer Ukraine a security guarantee resembling NATO’s collective defence mandate as part of an eventual deal to end the 3 1/2-year war.
“We were able to win the following concession: That the United States could offer Article 5-like protection, which is one of the real reasons why Ukraine wants to be in NATO,” he said on the CNN news programme State of the Union. Witkoff said it was the first time he had heard Putin agree to that.
Ukraine’s Zelenskyy, speaking in Brussels on Sunday after meeting European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, said the current front lines of the war should be the basis for peace talks.
“We need real negotiations, which means we can start where the front line is now,” Zelenskyy said, adding that European leaders support this and reiterating his long-held position that it was necessary to establish a ceasefire in order to then negotiate a final deal.
But after the summit on Friday with Putin yielded no clear breakthrough, Trump ruled out an immediate ceasefire – a move that aligns with Putin, who has long argued for negotiations on a final peace deal.
According to a New York Times report, after his meeting with Putin, the US president also told European leaders that he had offered to support a plan to end the war that involved Ukraine giving up parts of its territory to Russia.
Ukraine and its European allies have criticised Putin’s stance as a way to buy time and press Russia’s battlefield advances, and they have expressed unease over Trump’s land swap proposal from the outset.
In an effort to try show a firm, united front to the US president in White House talks on Monday, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, French President Emmanuel Macron, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte, Finland’s President Alexander Stubb, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni and von der Leyen will accompany Zelenskyy to Washington, DC.
“The talks will address, among other things, security guarantees, territorial issues, and continued support for Ukraine in its defence against Russian aggression,” the German government said in a statement about the trip to the US capital. “This includes maintaining pressure on sanctions.”
Ahead of the visit, von der Leyen said on X that she would welcome Zelenskyy for a meeting in Brussels on Sunday, which other European leaders would join by video, before accompanying the Ukrainian leader on his US trip at his “request” and with “other European leaders”.
This afternoon, I will welcome @ZelenskyyUa in Brussels.
Together, we will participate in the Coalition of Willing VTC.
At the request of President Zelenskyy, I will join the meeting with President Trump and other European leaders in the White House tomorrow.
— Ursula von der Leyen (@vonderleyen) August 17, 2025
Strength and safety in numbers appear to be factors in the group visit, with memories still fresh about the hostile reception Zelenskyy received in February from Trump and US Vice-President JD Vance in a public White House dressing-down, castigating the Ukrainian leader as being ungrateful and “disrespectful”.
While Zelenskyy has welcomed Trump’s efforts to end the war, in a post on social media on Saturday, he warned that “it may take a lot of effort to get Russia to have the will to implement far greater – peaceful coexistence with its neighbors for decades”.
The Ukrainian president has also repeatedly reiterated that Kyiv will not swap any of its land to attain a ceasefire. Ukraine’s constitution forbids the ceding of territory.
According to Zelenskyy, Putin has asked that Russia be handed over all of Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region, a third of which Kyiv still holds.
In exchange, Russian forces would halt their offensive in the Black Sea port region of Kherson and Zaporizhia in southern Ukraine, where the main cities are still under Ukrainian control.
Earlier this month, the Ukrainian president said that “Ukrainians will not give their land to the occupier” and pointed out that he doesn’t have the authority to sign off on land swaps. He said that changing Ukraine’s 1991 borders runs counter to the country’s constitution.
Russia launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 and has been gradually advancing for months.
In his statement after the Alaska summit, Putin signalled no movement in Russia’s long-held demands, which also include a veto on Kyiv’s desired membership in the NATO alliance.
He also warned Ukraine and its European allies not to “create any obstacles” and “that they will not attempt to disrupt the emerging progress through provocation or behind-the-scenes intrigue”.
The diplomatic focus now switches to Zelenskyy’s talks at the White House on Monday with the European leaders in tow.
In an interview with broadcaster Fox News after his sit-down with Putin, Trump had suggested that the onus was now on Zelenskyy to secure a peace deal as they work towards an eventual trilateral summit with Putin.
“It’s really up to President Zelenskyy to get it done,” Trump said.
European powers, however, want to help set up a trilateral meeting between Trump, Putin and Zelenskyy to make sure Ukraine has a seat at the table to shape its future.
They also want security guarantees for Ukraine with US involvement, and the ability to crank up pressure on Moscow if needed.
“They will spell out what they consider essential in terms of security guarantees: what they can do themselves, what falls to the coalition of volunteers, and also what they expect from the United States,” a European government official told the Reuters news agency.
“Indeed, they expect a very robust commitment.”
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Monday will meet US President Donald Trump in Washington to discuss an end to the more than three-year war in Ukraine, hours after Trump’s talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Alaska ended without a concrete deal.
In a post on his Truth Social platform after holding phone conversations with European Union and NATO leaders, Trump said the talks with Putin “went very well”.
“It was determined by all that the best way to end the horrific war between Russia and Ukraine is to go directly to a Peace Agreement, which would end the war, and not a mere Ceasefire Agreement, which often times do not hold up.”
Trump’s pitch for the peace agreement, analysts say, came after no deal was announced in the Alaska talks. Prior to the meeting, Trump had threatened Moscow to agree to a ceasefire.
Al Jazeera’s Osama Bin Javaid, reporting from Moscow, said there has been an atmosphere of success in Moscow.
“Trump’s remarks on the need for a larger peace agreement fall in line with what Putin has been saying for the last few months,” he said.
The Ukrainian leader and his European allies, who have been seeking a ceasefire, welcomed the Trump-Putin talks on Saturday but emphasised the need for a security guarantee for Kyiv.
Zelenskyy, who was publicly berated by Trump and his officials during his last Oval Office meeting, said, “I am grateful for the invitation.” The Ukrainian leader said he had a “long and substantive conversation with Trump”.
“In my conversation with President Trump, I said that sanctions should be tightened if there is no trilateral meeting or if Russia evades an honest end to the war,” the Ukrainian leader said.
He said that Ukraine needed a real, long-lasting peace and not “just another pause” between Russian invasions.
“Security must be guaranteed reliably and in the long term, with the involvement of both Europe and the US,” he said on X following his call with the European leaders.
Zelenskiy stressed that territorial issues can only be decided with Ukraine.
In his first public comment after the Alaska talks, Zelenskyy said he supported Trump’s proposal for a trilateral meeting between Ukraine, the US, and Russia, adding that Kyiv is “ready for constructive cooperation”.
“Ukraine reaffirms its readiness to work with maximum effort to achieve peace,” the Ukrainian president posted on X.
But Putin’s foreign affairs adviser, Yuri Ushakov, said on Russian state television on Saturday that a potential trilateral meeting between Trump, Putin and Zelenskyy has not been raised during the US-Russia discussions.
“The topic has not been touched upon yet,” Ushakov said, according to the Russian state news agency RIA Novosti.
Trump rolled out the red carpet on Friday for Putin, who was in the US for the first time in a decade, but he gave little concrete detail afterwards of what was discussed.
Trump said in Alaska that “there’s no deal until there’s a deal,” after Putin claimed the two leaders had hammered out an “understanding” on Ukraine and warned Europe not to “torpedo the nascent progress.”
Al Jazeera’s Charles Stratford, reporting from Kyiv, said Trump has been heavily criticised by the US media over the meeting in Alaska.
“They are concerned about what has been described as far more of a conciliatory tone by Trump towards Putin, without coming out of that meeting with even a ceasefire,” he said.
Stratford said that the eyes are now on the meeting in Washington as Zelenskyy and Trump try to set up a trilateral meeting with Putin.
“If all works out, we will then schedule a meeting with President Putin,” the US president said.
During an interview with Fox News Channel after the talks, Trump insisted that the onus going forward might be on Zelenskyy “to get it done,” but said there would also be some involvement from European nations.
Meanwhile, several European leaders on Saturday jointly pledged to continue support for Ukraine and maintain pressure on Russia until the war in Ukraine ends.
In a statement, EU leaders, including the French president and German chancellor, outlined key points in stopping the conflict.
They said: “Ukraine must have ironclad security guarantees to effectively defend its sovereignty and territorial integrity”.
Russia cannot have a veto against Ukraine‘s pathway to the EU and NATO, the statement said. “It will be up to Ukraine to make decisions on its territory. International borders must not be changed by force.”
Al Jazeera’s Hashem Ahelbarra, reporting from Brussels, said reaching a ceasefire in Ukraine is the priority of European leaders.
“They believe that there needs to be an immediate ceasefire before reaching a comprehensive deal on the future of Ukraine,” he said.
“Then they seek to provide security guarantees by deploying their own forces to make sure Russians will not violate the terms of that agreement,” our correspondent stressed, adding that European countries reject the notion of changing the borders by force.