Trump open to trilateral talks with Putin and Xi on Ukraine war

WASHINGTON DC: US President Donald Trump signalled on Monday (local time) that he is fully willing to hold a high-stakes trilateral meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping to end the war in Ukraine and pursue global denuclearisation, even if Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is excluded from the negotiations.

Speaking to reporters at the White House before departing for Kansas, President Trump confirmed he would readily meet with the Russian and Chinese leaders to broker peace and halt nuclear proliferation.

“Anything I can do to end the war, whether somebody’s there or not, whatever I could do to end the war,” Trump said when asked if he would meet with Xi and Putin without Zelenskyy present.

“And they do want to have a meeting. That’s my suggestion, because I’m going to be over in China in November, on the denuclearisation. And if we can do denuclearisation, I will have done the world a big, big favour.”

Addressing initial queries regarding a potential three-way sit-down with Moscow and Beijing, Trump noted that while a meeting had not yet been formally arranged, he actively supported the idea, primarily framed around global denuclearisation.

“No, but I would do it,” Trump said regarding a trilateral meeting. “Not so much for Ukraine, because Russia, frankly, has been fine on Ukraine. They haven’t been doing much. And the same thing with China. We would have it to talk about nuclear weapons and denuclearisation. And anytime I can have a meeting on denuclearisation… We have more—during my term, I did it. We have more nuclear weapons than anybody. Russia is second, China is third, but catching up.”