Russian President Vladimir Putin agreed to “immediately” start talks over the war in Ukraine during a “lengthy” call with President Donald Trump on Wednesday.
“We agreed to work together, very closely, including visiting each other’s Nations,” Trump posted to Truth Social on Wednesday. “We have also agreed to have our respective teams start negotiations immediately, and we will begin by calling President Zelenskyy, of Ukraine, to inform him of the conversation, something which I will be doing right now. I have asked Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Director of the CIA John Ratcliffe, National Security Advisor Michael Waltz, and Ambassador and Special Envoy Steve Witkoff, to lead the negotiations which, I feel strongly, will be successful.”
Since Russia’s initial invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, the two countries have been at war.
“We both reflected on the Great History of our Nations, and the fact that we fought so successfully together in World War II, remembering, that Russia lost tens of millions of people, and we, likewise, lost so many!” Trump added in his Truth Social post of his call with Putin.
“We each talked about the strengths of our respective Nations, and the great benefit that we will someday have in working together. But first, as we both agreed, we want to stop the millions of deaths taking place in the War with Russia/Ukraine. President Putin even used my very strong Campaign motto of, “COMMON SENSE.”
In late January, Putin praised Trump and expressed hope that the U.S. leader would “restore order” throughout the European continent amid the ongoing war in Ukraine.
“Trump, with his character and stubbornness, will restore order there quickly. And all of them – you will see – it will happen swiftly. Soon they will all sit at the feet of their master and gently wag their tails,” Putin said, according to a translation published byThe Daily Wrap.
The Russian president also claimed that Trump’s candidacy was widely opposed throughout Europe and that some countries may have actually interfered in the U.S. election because “mentally, the then-president Joe Biden suited them more.”
Putin added that “Trump has different ideas about what is good and what is bad – also in matters of gender policy and other issues. And they apparently do not like that,” the outlet reported.
Meanwhile, Trump on Friday suggested that the U.S., Russia, and Ukraine could be close to a negotiated settlement to the war that began with Russia’s invasion of its neighbor in February 2022.
“We will be speaking, and I think we’ll perhaps do something that’ll be significant,” Trump said in an exchange with reporters in the Oval Office, perABC News. “We want to end that war. That war would have not started if I was president.”
Trump did not say who in his administration had been in direct contact with either Putin or the Kremlin. Asked if he had personally spoken with the Russian president, Trump evaded: “I don’t want to say that.”
Since taking office, Trump has been critical of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky for not making a deal with Putin to avoid the conflict in the first place.
In another recent interview with Russian state television, Putinpraised Trumpas a “clever and pragmatic man” who remains laser-focused on putting U.S. interests first.
“We always had a business-like, pragmatic but also trusting relationship with the current U.S. president,” Putin said. “I couldn’t disagree with him that if he had been president — if they hadn’t stolen victory from him in 2020, the crisis that emerged in Ukraine in 2022 could have been avoided.”
During his campaign, Trump repeatedly criticized the Biden-Harris regime for pumping tens of billions of dollars into Ukraine’s war effort rather than seeking a negotiated settlement. To that point, however, Zelenesky said in an interview published at the weekend that he had no idea where Trump’s stated figure of “$200 billion” in assistance comes from, adding that his government has only received a fraction of that amount.
“When it is said that Ukraine received $200 billion to support the army during the war – that’s not true. I don’t know where all that money went. Perhaps it’s true on paper with hundreds of different programs – I won’t argue, and we’re immensely grateful for everything. But in reality, we received about $76 billion. It’s significant aid, but it’s not $200 billion,” hesaid.
Since 2022, Congress hasauthorizedroughly $175 billion for Ukraine, but a significant portion of that funding has reportedly gone to American industries and various US government activities related to the conflict, RT.com reported.
According to Germany’s Kiel Institute, as of October 2024, the US had allocated approximately $92 billion in financial and military aid to Ukraine, while EU countries and the UK had allocated $131 billion.
Zelensky also insisted that he has seen little actual cash, as more than $70 billion of the aid came in the form of direct military assistance.
“There are also many other humanitarian programs I’m uninformed about, except for knowing of their existence. Perhaps the US president’s administration will audit these programs and find additional billions, but I don’t know where those funds went,” he said.
