On Saturday, U.S. President Donald Trump shared his thoughts about the talks to end the war in Ukraine. He said that things might be going well, but there comes a time when you need to take action and stop just talking.
Trump made this comment to reporters while flying on Air Force One, after he showed his frustration with Russia the day before. He told Russia to “get moving” and make a deal soon.
Trump said, “I think Ukraine-Russia talks might be going okay, and we’ll find out soon.” But then he added, “There’s a point when you have to either do something or stop talking. We’ll see what happens, but I think it’s going fine.”
On Friday, Trump’s special envoy, Steve Witkoff, talked to Russian President Vladimir Putin about trying to make a peace deal. These talks came at a time when the U.S. and Russia weren’t agreeing on the terms for a ceasefire, or a break in the fighting, which was needed for the peace deal to happen.
Trump seemed to be losing patience, and he even talked about adding extra penalties, called sanctions, on countries that buy oil from Russia if Russia doesn’t make a deal soon.
Earlier that Saturday, Russia’s Foreign Minister, Sergei Lavrov, praised Trump. Lavrov said Trump understood the situation in Ukraine better than any other leader in the West.
Lavrov said that to fix the problem, you need to remove the main causes of the conflict. He agreed with Trump that it was a mistake for Ukraine to try to join NATO, a group of countries in the West, because this had made Russia feel threatened.
President Putin of Russia has said that Ukraine joining NATO was one of the reasons he started the war. Putin invaded Ukraine in February 2022 because he felt Ukraine becoming closer to the West was a danger to Russia.
Lavrov also talked about an agreement between Ukraine and Russia to stop attacking each other’s energy facilities, like power plants. He said that Russia had kept its promise, but accused Ukraine of attacking Russian energy facilities almost every day.
On the other hand, Ukraine has accused Russia of doing the same thing.
