After meeting with Zelensky, Trump calls on Ukraine and Russia to ‘stop where they are’ and end the war: NPR

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump on Friday called on Kiev and Moscow to “stop where they are” and end their brutal war after a lengthy White House meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

Trump’s frustration with the conflict appeared repeatedly during the nine months that followed his return to office, but with his latest statements he backed down in the direction of pressuring Ukraine to give up regaining the territories it lost to Russia.

“Enough blood has been spilled, with the boundaries of monarchy defined through war and courage,” Trump said in a post on Truth Social shortly after Zelensky and his team hosted more than two hours of talks. “They must stop where they are. Let each claim victory, and let history decide!”

Later, shortly after arriving in Florida, where he is spending the weekend, Trump urged both sides to “immediately stop the war” and implied that Moscow was keeping territory it seized from Kiev.

“You have to stick to the battle line wherever it is, otherwise it’s going to be very complicated,” Trump told reporters. “Stop at the battle line and both sides should go home, go to their families, stop killing, and it should be that way.”

These comments marked another shift in Trump’s stance on the war. In recent weeks, he has shown increasing impatience with Russian President Vladimir Putin and expressed greater openness to helping Ukraine win the war.

After meeting with Zelensky in New York on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly last month, Trump said he believed the Ukrainians could regain all the territory they had lost to Russia since Putin launched the February 2022 invasion. It was a dramatic shift for Trump, who had previously insisted that Kiev would have to cede territory it lost to Russia to end the war.

Zelensky said after Friday’s meeting that the time had come for a ceasefire and negotiations. He avoided directly answering a question about Trump pushing Ukraine to give up land.

“The president is right, we have to stop where we are, and then talk,” Zelensky said when reporters asked him about Trump’s social media post, which he had not seen.

Another change in tone

Trump’s tone on the war changed after he held a lengthy phone call with Putin on Thursday and announced that he planned to meet with the Russian leader in Budapest, Hungary, in the coming weeks.

The president also indicated to Zelensky on Friday that he is leaning against selling him long-range Tomahawk missiles, weapons that Ukrainians believe could be a game-changer in helping to get Putin to the negotiating table.

Zelensky said at the beginning of the White House talks that he had a “proposal” through which Ukraine could supply the United States with its advanced drones, while Washington would sell Kiev Tomahawk cruise missiles.

But Trump said he was reluctant to tap US supplies, a shift days after indicating he was seriously considering sending missiles to help Ukraine repel a Russian invasion.

“I also have an obligation to make sure that we as a nation have a full stock of weapons, because you never know what’s going to happen in war and peace,” Trump said. “We’d rather they didn’t need Tomahawk missiles. To be honest, we’d rather the war be over.”

In an interview with Kristen Welker on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” Zelensky noted that the door was not closed.

He added: “It is good that President Trump did not say no, but today he did not say yes.”

Zelensky also said: “We need Tomahawks” because “it is very difficult to work only with Ukrainian drones.”

Trump’s recent rhetoric on Tomahawk missiles has certainly been disappointing for the Ukrainians. In recent days, Trump has shown openness to selling Tomahawk missiles to Ukraine, even as Putin warned that such a move would further strain US-Russian relations.

Why tomahawk?

But after Thursday’s call with Putin, Trump began downplaying the chances of Ukraine obtaining the missiles, which have a range of about 995 miles (1,600 kilometers).

Zelensky was seeking Tomahawk missiles, which would allow Ukrainian forces to strike deep into Russian territory and target key military sites, energy facilities and critical infrastructure. Zelensky said the prospect of such strikes would help force Putin to take Trump’s calls for direct negotiations to end the war seriously.

Putin warned Trump during the call that supplying Kiev with Tomahawk missiles “will not change the situation on the battlefield, but will cause great damage to the relationship between our countries,” according to Yuri Ushakov, Putin’s foreign policy advisor.

This is the fifth direct meeting between Trump and Zelensky since the Republican president returned to office in January.

The president said on Friday that “it will be determined” whether Zelensky will participate in the upcoming talks in Hungary – suggesting that “holding a dual meeting” with the leaders of the warring nations is likely the most practical option for productive negotiations.

Trump added: “These two leaders don’t like each other, and we want to make it comfortable for everyone.”

But Zelensky told reporters that hostility toward Putin “is not about feelings.”

“They attacked us, so they are our enemies,” Zelensky added. “They do not intend to stop.” “So they are enemies. It’s not just about one person hating another person. Although, without a doubt, we hate the enemy. Without a doubt.”

Trump insisted, going back to his 2024 campaign, that he would end the war quickly, but his peace efforts appeared to stall after a diplomatic push in August, when he held a summit with Putin in Alaska and a White House meeting with Zelensky and European allies.

Trump emerged from those meetings confident that he was on the right track to arranging direct talks between Zelensky and Putin. But the Russian leader showed no interest in meeting with Zelensky, and Moscow contented itself with intensifying its bombing of Ukraine.

When asked on Friday if he was concerned that Putin was deceiving him, Trump acknowledged that was a possibility but said he was confident in his ability to deal with the Russian leader.

“I’ve played with the best of them all my life, and I came out really well,” Trump said. “I think I’m pretty good at these things,” he added.