Plans for Trump-Putin Summit Delayed Shortly After Budapest Negotiations Suggested
There are "no arrangements" for US President President Trump to meet Russia's Vladimir Putin "in the near term", a White House official has announced.
This past week Trump indicated he and the Russian president would conduct negotiations in Budapest soon to address the ongoing hostilities.
A preparatory meeting between America's top diplomat Marco Rubio and his Russian counterpart Foreign Minister Lavrov was due to be held this week - but the administration clarified the two had had a "positive" discussion and that a meeting was no longer "needed".
The administration withheld any more details on why the talks had been postponed.
Earlier Events
The US president had discussed a Hungarian meeting via telephone with Putin, a just prior to hosting Ukraine's President Zelensky in the Oval Office.
Various sources claimed his talks with the Ukrainian leader had been a "heated exchange", with sources claiming the president had urged him to relinquish extensive regions of Ukraine's east as part of a settlement with Moscow.
Nevertheless, on this week Trump endorsed a ceasefire proposal endorsed by Kyiv and European leaders to halt the hostilities on the present positions.
"Leave it as is in its current state," he remarked.
Russia has consistently objected against pausing the existing front lines.
Moscow was exclusively seeking "permanent resolution", Lavrov said on Tuesday, implying that halting hostilities would merely represent a temporary ceasefire.
Negotiating Stances
The "underlying reasons" of the conflict needed to be addressed, Lavrov emphasized, using Russian diplomatic language for a series of comprehensive conditions that encompass the acknowledgment of full Russian sovereignty over the eastern region as well as the military reduction of the country – a non-starter for Ukraine and its Western allies.
Zelensky said discussions about the current lines were the "start of negotiations" but that Russia was "doing everything" to evade negotiations.
He additionally stated the exclusive issue that could make Moscow "become engaged" was that of the provision of distance-capable munitions to Ukraine.
Strategic Factors
The Russian president's unscheduled call with the US leader recently occurred before speculation that the United States was planning to provide long-range Tomahawk missiles to Ukrainian forces that could theoretically target Russian territory.
The Ukrainian leader said it was the weapons consideration that had forced Russia to enter into dialogue. The talk about the weapons systems had turned out to be a "valuable contribution" in negotiations", he added.