Putin Wants to Make a Deal on Ukraine: Trump

Russian President Vladimir Putin is seeking to make a deal in the Russia–Ukraine war, President Donald Trump told reporters following a recent conversation between the two leaders.

Putin wants to make a deal, and if Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy similarly wants “to make a deal, that’d be very nice,” Trump told reporters ​on Wednesday before boarding Air Force One en route to Dallas for ​the Republican National Convention.

Trump added that many people were losing their lives in the conflict.

“Twenty-five thousand last month,” he said.

The comments followed a recent call between Trump and Putin. Russian presidential aide Yury Ushakov told Russian media outlets on Tuesday that both leaders had an hour-long call.

“The leaders exchanged views on the outcomes of the trips of U.S. special presidential representatives Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner to Moscow and Kyiv,” Ushakov said, according to Interfax.

The two U.S. envoys had met with Putin on Saturday. They then traveled to Ukraine and met President Volodymyr Zelenskyy the following day to discuss a peace deal.

According to a statement released by Zelenskyy’s office, Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law, said on Sunday that Trump was seeking to “find a pathway to end this war.” In a press conference following the meeting, Zelenskyy said that restarting the negotiation process is important.

British Prime Minister Andy Burnham and Trump held a phone call on Monday and agreed to continue working toward a ceasefire between Ukraine and Russia, according to the prime minister’s office.

Sentencing Anti-War Politician

Last month, a Russian court sentenced Lev Shlosberg, deputy chair of the Yabloko party, to more than 11 years in prison. Shlosberg was accused of spreading false information about the Russian military.

In a closing speech to the court in the city of Pskov in August, he maintained his innocence, said he was the victim of a political trial, and repeated his call for an immediate ceasefire in the 4-1/2-year war.

Meanwhile, Germany last week accused Moscow of attempting a drone attack on the Leipzig/Halle airport in early August.

German authorities said at the time that they had discovered an unmanned aerial vehicle laden with explosives near a Ukrainian cargo plane at the Leipzig/Halle airport. The device was subsequently defused.

The attempted strike would have been a serious attack on Germany’s infrastructure and national security, German authorities said in early September.

Russian Ambassador to Germany Sergey Nechaev “resolutely rejected Berlin’s accusations as unsubstantiated, absurd, and contrary to common sense,” the Russian Embassy in Berlin said at the time.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova criticized the allegations against Russia on Wednesday, calling them hysterical.

Victoria Friedman and Reuters contributed to this report.