Evian-les-Bains, France. U.S. President Donald Trump said Russia should make peace with Ukraine after what he described as a “very good” meeting with President Volodymyr Zelenskiy on Tuesday. His comments prompted cautious optimism among G7 leaders that a peace deal could be reached.
Shift in tone at G7 summit
The more upbeat mood surrounding the war in Ukraine, now in its fifth year, contrasted sharply with Zelenskiy’s meeting with Trump in the Oval Office last year, when Trump told him he had no leverage in potential peace talks with Russia.
Zelenskiy and his European allies arrived at the G7 summit in the French resort of Evian-les-Bains seeking to persuade Trump that Ukraine’s position on the battlefield had improved following drone incursions deep into Russia.
Trump calls for a deal
Trump, who arrived at the summit holding a preliminary deal to end his war with Iran, said he would do what he could to help end the conflict in Ukraine, though he gave few details on specific measures to increase pressure on Moscow.
“Look, Russia should make a deal,” Trump told reporters, adding that too many young men were dying on both sides of the battlefield. “I’m gonna do whatever I can.”
European response
German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said Trump’s remarks that Russia should end the war were encouraging.
“I found him to be very cooperative, and I also saw him listening very attentively,” Merz told reporters. “And in that respect, once again, it gives me a certain degree of optimism that we here, as Europeans and as Americans, are now doing everything we can, together, to end the war.”
Sanctions and diplomacy
After the group meeting with Trump, Zelenskiy told Reuters that G7 leaders agreed Russia was not winning the war. He said they also discussed additional sanctions aimed at Russia’s oil exports, banking sector and military production in an effort to bring Moscow to the negotiating table.
Zelenskiy, who was due to hold face-to-face talks with Trump later on Tuesday, said he had offered to meet Russian President Vladimir Putin at the G7 summit. A Kremlin aide said that possibility did not arise during a call between Trump and Putin.
Images shown to Trump
Two European diplomats said Zelenskiy showed Trump images during the meeting of the aftermath of a Russian strike on Monday on Kyiv’s Pechersk Lavra monastery.
