WASHINGTON (Reuters) -President Donald Trump said on Monday that the United States would help Europe in providing security for Ukraine as part of any deal to end Russia’s war in Ukraine, as he and President Volodymyr Zelenskiy began a hastily arranged White House meeting to discuss a path to peace.
But he also suggested to reporters that he no longer believed reaching a ceasefire was a necessary prerequisite for striking a peace agreement, backing a position staked out by Russian President Vladimir Putin and opposed by Zelenskiy and most European leaders.
The two leaders took questions from the media in the Oval Office before meeting in private, six months after their last appearance there descended into disaster when Trump and Vice President JD Vance upbraided Zelenskiy in an extraordinary apublic dressing-down.
This time, Trump and Zelenskiy struck a far more convivial tone, despite the U.S. president’s movement toward Russia in recent days following his summit in Alaska with Putin. And Zelenskiy was backed by the leaders of Britain, Germany, France, Italy, Finland, the European Union and NATO, who traveled to Washington to demonstrate solidarity with Ukraine and push for strong security guarantees for the country in any post-war settlement.
“When it comes to security, there’s going to be a lot of help,” Trump told reporters, adding that European countries would be involved. “They are a first line of defence because they’re there, but we’ll help them out.”
Trump greeted Zelenskiy outside the White House, shaking his hand and expressing delight at Zelenskiy’s black suit, a departure from his typical military clothes.
When a reporter asked Trump what his message was to the people of Ukraine, he said twice, “We love them.” Zelenskiy thanked him, and Trump put his hand on Zelenskiy’s back in a show of affection before the two men went inside to the Oval Office.
Trump is pressing for a quick end to Europe’s deadliest war in 80 years, and Kyiv and its allies worry he could seek to force an agreement on Russia’s terms after the president on Friday in Alaska rolled out the red carpet – literally – for Putin, who faces an arrest warrant from the International Criminal Court for war crimes.
Trump said he liked the concept of a ceasefire, but they could work on a peace deal while the fighting continued.
“I wish they could stop, I’d like them to stop,” he said. “But strategically that could be a disadvantage for one side or the other.”
He also said he believes Putin wants to end the war and that he hopes the three leaders can soon organize a trilateral meeting. Putin has not committed to such a meeting, though Zelenskiy said he is ready to sit down.
“We need to stop this war, to stop Russia and we need support – American and European partners,” Zelenskiy told reporters.
The European leaders were to meet with Trump later on Monday, according to the White House. Such a high-level gathering at the White House on such short notice appears to be unprecedented in recent times.
Russian attacks overnight on Ukrainian cities killed at least 10 people, in what Zelenskiy called a “cynical” effort to undermine talks.
Trump has rejected accusations that the Alaska summit had been a win for Putin, who has faced diplomatic isolation since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
“I know exactly what I’m doing, and I don’t need the advice of people who have been working on all of these conflicts for years, and were never able to do a thing to stop them,” Trump wrote on social media.
Trump’s team has said there will have to be compromises on both sides to end the conflict. But the president himself has put the burden on Zelenskiy to end the war, saying Ukraine should give up hopes of getting back Crimea, annexed by Russia in 2014, or of joining the NATO military alliance.
PUTIN’S PROPOSALS
Zelenskiy has already all but rejected the outline of Putin’s proposals from the Alaska meeting. Those include handing over the remaining quarter of its eastern Donetsk region, which is largely controlled by Russia. Ukrainian forces are deeply dug into the region, whose towns and hills serve as a crucial defensive zone to stymie Russian attacks.
Any concession of Ukrainian territory would have to be approved by a referendum.
Ukraine and its allies have taken heart from some developments, including Trump’s apparent willingness to provide post-settlement security guarantees for Ukraine. A German government spokesperson said on Monday that European leaders would seek more details on that in the talks in Washington.
The war, which began with a full-scale invasion by Russia in February 2022, has killed or wounded more than a million people from both sides, including thousands of mostly Ukrainian civilians, according to analysts, and destroyed wide swaths of the country.
Putin himself faces an arrest warrant from the International Criminal Court over the abduction and deportation of Ukrainian children, adding controversy to Trump’s decision to invite him to Alaska.
Russia has been slowly grinding forward on the battlefield, pressing its advantages in men and firepower. Putin says he is ready to continue fighting until his military objectives are achieved.
Officials in Ukraine said a drone attack on a residential complex in the northern city of Kharkiv killed at least seven people, including a toddler and her 16-year-old brother. Strikes in the southeastern city of Zaporizhzhia killed three people, they said.
Russia says it does not deliberately target civilians, and the Defense Ministry’s daily report did not refer to any strike on Kharkiv.
Local resident Olena Yakusheva said the attack hit an apartment block that was home to many families. “There are no offices here or anything else, we lived here peacefully in our homes,” she said.
Ukraine’s military said on Monday that its drones had struck an oil pumping station in Russia’s Tambov region, leading to the suspension of supplies via the Druzhba pipeline.
(Reporting by Max Hunder, Tom Balmforth, Trevor Hunnicutt, Sabine Wollrab, Vitalii Hnidyi, Tim Kelly, Fabian Hamacher, Ludwig Burger, Anita KomuvesWriting by Andy Sullivan, Matthias Williams and Joseph AxEditing by Frances Kerry, Sharon Singleton, Don Durfee and Alistair Bell)
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