Trump says he intends to meet Putin and Zelensky NEXT WEEK

President Trump intends to meet in person with President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia as soon as next week, and he plans to follow up shortly afterward with a meeting between himself, Mr. Putin and President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine, according to two people familiar with the plan

Mr. Trump disclosed his plans on Wednesday in a call with European leaders, which included Mr. Zelensky, the people said.

The meetings would include only the three men, and would not include European counterparts.

Asked later Wednesday if Russia and Ukraine had agreed to the summit, Mr. Trump told reporters: “There’s a very good prospect that they will.”

Mr. Putin’s spokesman, Dmitri S. Peskov, did not respond to a request for comment, but Mr. Zelensky appeared to signal that a direct meeting was possible.

“It seems that Russia is now more committed to a cease-fire. The pressure on them is working,” Mr. Zelensky said in his evening address to the nation. “But the main thing is that they do not deceive us or the United States in the details.”

Just a meeting with Mr. Trump would represent something of a victory for Mr. Putin. Since the Ukraine invasion, he has been largely isolated by NATO leaders, who refused to deal with him directly until Mr. Trump started phone conversations with the Russian leader after coming to office.

But the plan reflects Mr. Trump’s deep belief that his powers of persuasion, especially in an in-person meeting, are the only way to strike a bargain.

If the meeting goes ahead as Mr. Trump described, it would be the first in-person summit between an American and Russian president in more than four years. The last took place in June 2021 in Geneva, when President Joseph R. Biden Jr. met one-on-one with Mr. Putin.

Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, said in a statement on Wednesday that the Russians asked for the meeting.

“The Russians expressed their desire to meet with President Trump, and the president is open to meeting with both President Putin and President Zelensky,” she said. “President Trump wants this brutal war to end.”

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