US President Donald Trump has said he came away disappointed from a telephone call with Russian President Vladimir Putin because it does not appear the latter is looking to stop Russia’s war against Ukraine.
US attempts to end Russia’s war in Ukraine through diplomacy have largely stalled, and Trump has faced growing calls, including from some Republicans, to increase pressure on Putin to negotiate in earnest.
After speaking to Putin on Thursday, Trump plans to speak to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Friday, he said in remarks to reporters on his return to Washington from a trip to Iowa.
“I’m very disappointed with the conversation I had today with President Putin, because I don’t think he’s there, and I’m very disappointed,” Trump said.
“I’m just saying I don’t think he’s looking to stop, and that’s too bad.”
The two leaders did not discuss a recent pause in some US weapons shipments to Kiev during the nearly hour-long conversation, a summary provided by Putin aide Yuri Ushakov showed.
Zelenskyy told reporters in Denmark earlier in the day that he hopes to speak to Trump as soon as Friday about the pause in some weapons shipments first disclosed this week.
Speaking to reporters as he left Washington for Iowa, Trump said, “We haven’t completely paused the flow of weapons, but blamed his predecessor, Joe Biden, for sending so many weapons that it risked weakening US defences.
The diplomatic back-and-forth comes as low stockpiles have prompted the US to pause shipments of certain critical weapons to Ukraine, sources told Reuters earlier, just as it faces a Russian summer offensive and growing attacks on civilian targets.
Putin, for his part, has continued to assert he will stop only if the conflict’s “root causes” have been tackled, making use of Russian shorthand for the issue of NATO enlargement and Western support for Ukraine, including the rejection of any notion of Ukraine joining the NATO alliance.
Latest drone strike
Within hours of their concluding the call, an apparent Russian drone attack sparked a fire in an apartment building in a northern suburb of Kiev, Ukrainian officials said, indicating little change in the trajectory of the conflict.
In Kiev , Reuters reported explosions and sustained heavy machine-gun fire as air defence units battled drones over the capital, while Russian shelling killed five people in the east.
AFP journalists in the capital heard drones buzzing over Kiev and explosions ringing out as Ukrainian air defence systems fended off the attack.
Zelenskyy said the air alerts had begun echoing out across the country as reports of the president’s call emerged.
“Yet again, Russia is showing it has no intention of ending the war and terror,” Zelenskyy said on social media.
'Complete disregard'
Russia's attacks have escalated over recent weeks.
An AFP tally shows Moscow launched a record number of drones and missiles at Ukraine in June, as direct peace talks between Kiev and Moscow appeared to stall.
“Putin clearly shows his complete disregard for the United States and everyone who has called for an end to the war,” Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andriy Sybiga wrote on social media after the attack.
Ukraine has also ramped up its drone strikes in Russia, where a woman was killed when a Ukrainian drone crashed into an apartment building, the region's acting governor said.
Poland calls on Trump
Poland’s foreign minister called on Trump to restore supplies of anti-aircraft ammunition to Ukraine after the Polish embassy’s consular section in Kiev was damaged during a Russian attack.
“President Trump, Putin is mocking your peace efforts,” Radoslaw Sikorski wrote on X. “Please restore supplies of anti-aircraft ammunition to Ukraine and impose tough new sanctions on the aggressor.”
