WASHINGTON: Donald Trump discussed the war in Ukraine on Wednesday in phone calls with his Russian and Ukrainian counterparts Vladimir Putin and Volodymyr Zelensky, the new US president’s first big step towards diplomacy over a war he has promised to end. In a post on his social media platform, Trump said he and Putin had “agreed to have our respective teams start negotiations immediately, and we will begin by calling President Zelensky, of Ukraine, to inform him of the conversation, something which I will be doing right now”. Zelensky’s office said Trump and the Ukrainian leader had spoken by phone for about an hour.

The Kremlin said Putin and Trump had agreed to meet, and Putin had invited Trump to visit Moscow.

Trump has long said he would quickly end the war in Ukraine, without saying how he would accomplish this.

Earlier on Wednesday, Trump’s Defence Secretary, Pete Hegseth, said a return to Ukraine’s pre-2014 borders was unrealistic and the US administration did not see Nato membership for Kyiv as part of a solution to the war.

Speaking at a meeting of Ukraine’s military allies at Nato headquarters in Brussels on Wednesday, Hegseth delivered the clearest and bluntest public statement so far on the new US administration’s approach to the three-year-old war.

“We want, like you, a sovereign and prosperous Ukraine. But we must start by recognising that returning to Ukraine’s pre-2014 borders is an unrealistic objective,” Hegseth told a meeting of Ukraine and more than 40 allies in Brussels.

“Chasing this illusionary goal will only prolong the war and cause more suffering.”

No peace talks have been held since the early months of the war, now approaching its third anniversary. Former US president Joe Biden and most Western leaders held no direct discussions with Putin after Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in Feb 2022.

Ukraine succeeded in the war’s first year in pushing Russian forces back from the outskirts of Kyiv and recapturing swathes of Russian-occupied territory.

Published in Dawn, February 13th, 2025