Trump said a year ago that a summit with Putin and Zelensky was two weeks away. Moscow now says the three of them can meet only to finalize agreements that don’t yet exist.
A trilateral meeting of the U.S., Russian, and Ukrainian presidents is possible only to formalize agreements, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said.
Peskov was responding to a report by Axios that CIA Director John Ratcliffe had proposed a meeting involving Vladimir Putin, Donald Trump, and Volodymyr Zelensky during Ratcliffe’s visit to Moscow.
“There have long been proposals to hold a Putin-Trump-Zelensky summit. And you know our head of state’s position well: such a meeting is possible only to formalize agreements. Agreements are by no means a crude deal,” the Russian news agency Interfax quoted Peskov as saying.
The Kremlin spokesman said this is a very complex settlement process, involving an enormous number of details.
“Naturally, it is absolutely pointless for the presidents to meet to discuss all of this. They can meet only to finalize agreements. But actually working toward a settlement is exactly what the Kyiv side does not want,” Peskov said.
Trump said as early as August 2025 that he had begun preparing for a trilateral summit with Zelensky and Putin. He expected to hold it within two weeks. No such meeting has taken place since.
On June 4 this year, Zelensky published an open letter to Putin proposing that the two meet in person to negotiate an end to the war. The next day, speaking at the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum, Putin said he saw no point in meeting Zelensky at the time.
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