Russian President Vladimir Putin said Wednesday his country needs to build trust with the United States before his country’s three-year war on neighboring Ukraine can be resolved.
Putin told reporters in Saint Petersburg that he was pleased with the outcome of high-level talks between top U.S. and Russian officials in Saudi Arabia on Tuesday, rating them “highly,” and declaring that they were a “first step” in improving contentious relations between Moscow and Washington.
But he added, “It is impossible to solve many issues, including the Ukrainian crisis, without increasing the level of trust between Russia and the United States.”
Putin said in televised remarks that he would like to hold a summit with U.S. President Donald Trump, “but it needs to be prepared so that it brings results.”
The Riyadh talks, led by U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, were the first significant discussions between the two superpowers in more than three years following Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine and the U.S.-led Western effort to arm Kyiv’s forces to fend off the attack.
“I was briefed [on the talks]. I rate them highly, there are results,” Putin was quoted by the Interfax news agency as saying at a drone factory in Saint Petersburg. “In my opinion, we made the first step to restore work in various areas of mutual interests.”
Neither Ukrainian nor European officials were at the table in a Saudi palace for the talks, but the U.S. said they would be involved in future negotiations to try to end Europe’s most deadly conflict since World War II. Moscow launched the invasion three years ago next week.
Russia failed to take over all of Ukraine in the first stages of the war but now controls about a fifth of Ukraine’s internationally recognized territory. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said repeatedly his country will not accept a dictated settlement of the conflict.
While former U.S. President Joe Biden provided tens of billions of dollars in arms for Kyiv, new U.S. President Donald Trump has pushed for a fast end to the Moscow-initiated war.
He contended Tuesday that Ukraine “should never have started” it.
In a new comment Wednesday on his Truth Social platform, Trump called Zelenskyy a “dictator,” claiming “the only thing he was good at was playing Biden ‘like a fiddle’ to get more military assistance.”
“I love Ukraine, but Zelenskyy has done a terrible job, his Country is shattered, and MILLIONS have unnecessarily died – And so it continues….,” Trump wrote.
Speaking ahead of talks with Trump’s Ukraine envoy in Kyiv, Zelenskyy told Ukrainian TV, “President Trump … unfortunately lives in this disinformation space.”
US envoy in Ukraine ‘to listen’
The envoy, Gen. Keith Kellogg, said the United States understands the need for security guarantees for Ukraine in any negotiated end to the war.
Kellogg said he was in Ukraine “to listen,” hear the concerns of Ukrainian leaders and return to the United States to consult with Trump.
Kellogg said the United States wants the war in Ukraine to end, saying it would be good for the region and the world.
Zelenskyy told reporters ahead of the meeting with Kellogg that while U.S. officials have said there will be no U.S. troops deployed as part of any potential post-war peacekeeping mission, there are still other ways it can help, such as providing air defense systems.
“You don’t want boots on the ground, you don’t want NATO,” Zelenskyy said. “Okay, can we have Patriots? Enough Patriots?”
The discussions in Kyiv came amid a flurry of diplomatic efforts focused on the war, including French President Emmanuel Macron hosting European leaders Wednesday for a second round of talks about the conflict and European support for Ukraine. Kellogg also met earlier this week with European leaders.
Rubio said Tuesday after meeting with Lavrov that both Ukraine and Russia would have to make concessions to achieve peace.
“The goal is to bring an end to this conflict in a way that’s fair, enduring, sustainable and acceptable to all parties involved,” Rubio told reporters.
Zelenskyy objected to being excluded from the meeting, a position that Trump on Tuesday scoffed at.
“Today I heard, ‘Well, we weren’t invited.’ Well, you’ve been there for three years,” Trump said of Ukraine’s leaders, whom he accused of starting the war.
Zelenskyy postponed a trip to Saudi Arabia that had been scheduled for this week, suggesting that he wanted to avoid his visit being linked to the U.S.-Russia talks.
State Department spokeswoman Tammy Bruce said in a statement after the Riyadh talks that the U.S. and Russia agreed to “appoint respective high-level teams to begin working on a path to ending the conflict in Ukraine as soon as possible.” Bruce characterized the meeting as “an important step forward” toward peace.
Rubio said Ukraine and European nations would have to be involved in talks on ending the war. He said that if the war is halted, the United States would have “extraordinary opportunities … to partner” with Russia on trade and other global issues.
European Union foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas, an Estonian, said she and other European foreign ministers spoke to Rubio after the U.S.-Russia meeting, and she expressed support for a Ukraine-led resolution.
“Russia will try to divide us. Let’s not walk into their traps,” Kallas said on X. “By working together with the U.S., we can achieve a just and lasting peace — on Ukraine’s terms.”
Zelenskyy has long demanded that his country’s 2014 boundaries be restored, but U.S. officials have said that is unrealistic, as is Kyiv’s long-sought goal of joining NATO as part of a negotiated settlement.
Some information for this story was provided by The Associated Press, Agence France-Presse and Reuters.
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