US President Trump says Kyiv and Moscow have no choice but to secure a peace deal to end the war.
United States and Ukrainian officials have indicated they will meet in Saudi Arabia next week to discuss a peace framework for ending the Russia-Ukraine war.
This follows Washington suspending military aid and intelligence sharing with Kyiv this week, days after US President Donald Trump and his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelenskyy clashed at the White House.
Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff confirmed he will meet Ukrainian officials in Saudi Arabia next week to carve out a framework for a peace agreement.
“We are now in discussions to coordinate a meeting with the Ukrainians in Riyadh or even potentially Jeddah. So the city is moving around a little bit, but it will be Saudi Arabia,” Witkoff told reporters outside the White House on Thursday.
“I think the idea is to get down a framework for a peace agreement and an initial ceasefire as well.”
Zelenskyy also said he will travel to Saudi Arabia on Monday with a cadre of officials and plans to hold talks with US officials.
“I am scheduled to visit Saudi Arabia to meet with the Crown Prince. After that, my team will stay in Saudi Arabia to work with American partners,” Zelenskyy said in an evening address on Thursday. “Ukraine is most interested in peace.”
This will be the first high-level meeting of US and Ukrainian officials since the February 28 meeting between Zelenskyy and Trump devolved into a shouting match and ended with the Ukrainian leader being asked to leave the White House.
Following the public spat, Trump severed intelligence-sharing and aid to Ukraine.
However, on Tuesday, he said he had received a letter from Zelenskyy in which the Ukrainian leader said he was “ready to come to the negotiating table as soon as possible”.
‘Ukraine wants to make a deal’
Trump, in an exchange with reporters on Thursday, said he believed his administration had made “a lot of progress” in recent days with both Ukraine and Russia, but did not specify how.
“I think what’s going to happen is Ukraine wants to make a deal, because I don’t think they have a choice,” Trump said.
“I also think that Russia wants to make a deal because in a certain different way – a different way that only I know, only I know – they have no choice either.”
Trump’s envoy Witkoff on Thursday noted that Zelenskyy has been apologetic in recent days about the White House blow-up and expressed gratitude.
He was wary about whether the much-touted minerals deal by Washington would be signed during the meeting in Saudi Arabia. “We’ll see if he follows through,” Witkoff added.
The proposed deal is seen by many analysts as an attempt by Kyiv to win the support of the new US administration amid tensions over Washington’s outreach to Moscow to end the Ukraine war.
Trump administration officials have said the economic pact would bind the US and Ukraine closer together and would give Russian President Vladimir Putin pause before considering malign action against Ukraine in the future.
The agreement would give the US access to Ukraine’s rare earth deposits and could be of value to US aerospace, electric vehicle and medical manufacturing.