Trump holds first call with Putin after pause in Ukraine weapons shipments

The two leaders’ latest conversation comes as the White House has pulled back from efforts to broker peace between Moscow and Ukraine

President Trump has been critical of President Putin in recent days.

President Trump spoke with Russian President Vladimir Putin over the phone on Thursday, in the two leaders’ first conversation since the US paused a series of weapons shipments for Ukraine.

Trump urged Putin to quickly end the war in Ukraine but the Russian president refused, according to a Kremlin briefing on the call. The White House has yet to release its own summary.

During the nearly hour-long call, Putin told Trump that Russia won’t abandon its goal to eliminate root causes of the conflict in Ukraine, according to Yuri Ushakov, a close adviser to the Russian president. The reference to root causes is Kremlin shorthand for barring Ukraine from accepting Western assistance and diminishing its sovereignty as an independent state.

“Our president said that Russia will achieve its goals, that is, the elimination of the well-known root causes that led to the current state of affairs,” Ushakov said, quoted by state news agency TASS. “Russia will not back down from these goals.”

Ushakov said that Putin expressed Russia’s readiness to continue the negotiation process with Ukraine. However, specific dates for a new round of talks between Kyiv and Moscow weren’t discussed, Ushakov said. Trump and Putin also didn’t discuss the pause in arms shipments to Ukraine, Ushakov said.

Trump has been critical of Putin in recent days, declaring at the NATO summit last week that the Russian president was most responsible for continuing the three-year-old war with Ukraine.

The White House had pulled back from efforts to broker a peace deal between Kyiv and Moscow after failing last month to persuade Putin to accept a temporary ceasefire. The US decision to halt the transfer of Patriot interceptors and other weapons earmarked for Ukraine has raised concerns among Ukrainian officials about their ability to withstand Moscow’s mounting and increasingly deadly aerial assaults.

Trump is also scheduled to speak with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Friday, an administration official said.

Wall Street Journal