President Donald Trump has announced that US, Russian and Ukrainian officials will meet at a security conference in Munich, Germany on Friday for talks on how to end the war in Ukraine.
“Russia is going to be there with our people,” the US President said. “Ukraine is also invited, by the way, not sure exactly who’s going to be there from any country – but high-level people from Russia, from Ukraine and from the United States.”
However, Russia – which is not officially attending the annual forum in Germany – did not comment and a senior Ukrainian official said “talks with Russians in Munich” were “not expected”.
America’s NATO allies are still reacting to Trump’s surprise announcement this week that he and Russian President Vladimir Putin had agreed in a phone call to begin talks to end the war.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is due to meet Trump’s Vice-President, JD Vance, in Munich.
Zelensky is also expected to meet US Secretary of State Marco Rubio.
Rubio’s plane had to turn back to a US airbase in Maryland late on Thursday, after it experienced a “mechanical issue” on its way to the German city. He was then due to take a different plane.
The US President announced the three-way meeting in Munich during a press conference on Thursday, without giving any further details.
However, Zelensky adviser Dmytro Lytvyn told reporters the Ukrainian delegation had no plans to attend such a meeting.
Russia did not immediately respond to a BBC request for comment on the issue.
Trump’s announcement came a day after he held separate phone calls first with Putin, then with Zelensky.
Describing the talks as “great”, Trump said there was a “good possibility of ending that horrible, very bloody war”.
But he said it was not “practical” for Kyiv to join the NATO military alliance and also “unlikely” that Ukraine could return to its pre-invasion borders in 2014.
Zelensky – who admitted it was “not very pleasing” that Trump had spoken to Putin before him – warned that Ukraine would not agree to any peace deal proposed by the US and Russia without Kyiv’s involvement.
“We cannot accept it, as an independent country,” he said, stressing that his priority was “security guarantees”, something he did not see without US support.
Zelensky said European allies “needed to be at the negotiating table too”, amid growing fears across the continent that Trump’s overture to Putin could lead to a separate US-Russia deal on Ukraine’s and Europe’s future.
French President Emmanuel Macron told the Financial Times that only Zelensky could negotiate on behalf of his country with Russia, warning a “peace that is a capitulation” would be “bad news for everyone”.
BBC
