Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has said his meeting at the Vatican with US President Donald Trump could prove historic if the peaceful end to Ukraine’s war with Russia that they discussed is achieved.
The meeting lasted about 15 minutes and took place in St Peter’s Basilica ahead of the funeral of Pope Francis this morning, a White House official said earlier.
“Good meeting. One-on-one, we managed to discuss a lot. We hope for a result from all the things that were spoken about,” Mr Zelensky wrote in a post on social media platform Telegram.
He said those topics included “the protection of the lives of our people. A complete and unconditional ceasefire. A reliable and lasting peace that will prevent a recurrence of war.”
Mr Zelensky added: “It was a very symbolic meeting that has the potential to become historic if we achieve joint results. Thank you, President Donald Trump!”
Mr Trump and the Ukrainian president were said to have agreed to have further talks today, a Ukrainian spokesperson said earlier, after a “very productive discussion” this morning.
Ukrainian presidential spokesman Serhiy Nykyforov said both sides were working to make arrangements to facilitate further negotiations.
However, Mr Zelensky’s office later said there was no second meeting due to the tight schedule of both presidents.
Mr Trump has now left Rome after attending the funeral.
White House Communications Director Steven Cheung said the two leaders “met privately today and had a very productive discussion”.
The meeting between the two leaders at the Vatican was their first since an angry encounter in the Oval Office in Washington in February.
Mr Trump and Mr Zelensky, both accompanied by their wives, sat in the front row of the funeral in St Peter’s Square but were separated by nearly a dozen leaders.
Apparent applause was heard in the crowds as Mr Zelensky arrived at the funeral.
Both sides had kept the prospects of a meeting vague ahead of the funeral, with Mr Trump saying only if it was “possible”.
Photographs of today’s meeting were released by Ukrainian officials, and showed the two men talking directly, without any aides present.
Trump says maybe Putin ‘doesn’t want to stop the war’ in Ukraine
Meanwhile, Mr Trump on Saturday has criticised Russian President Vladimir Putin for attacks on civilian areas of Ukraine in recent days, and said “maybe he doesn’t want to stop the war.”
In a post on Truth Social after his talks with Mr Zelensky in Rome, Mr Trump also said maybe Mr Putin “has to be dealt with differently,” possibly through additional sanctions targeting Russia.
“There was no reason for Putin to be shooting missiles into civilian areas, cities and towns, over the last few days,” Mr Trump said in the post.
“It makes me think that maybe he doesn’t want to stop the war, he’s just tapping me along, and has to be dealt with differently, through ‘Banking’ or ‘Secondary Sanctions?’ Too many people are dying!!!”
Mr Putin told US envoy Steve Witkoff at yesterday’s meeting in Moscow that he was ready for talks with Ukraine “without preconditions,” the Kremlin said Saturday.
Tensions have been high since Mr Trump and US Vice President JD Vance berated Mr Zelensky in the Oval Office on 28 February, calling him ungrateful for the billions of dollars of US military assistance given since Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022.
Mr Trump has recently blamed Mr Zelensky for the war and the continuing bloodshed.
He has also pushed Mr Zelensky to accept previously unpalatable concessions such as acknowledging that Crimea, which Moscow seized from Ukraine in 2014, will remain in Russian hands under any deal to stop the conflict.
Arriving in Rome late yesterday, Mr Trump pushed for Russian and Ukrainian leaders to meet after what he said was progress in talks.
“They are very close to a deal, and the two sides should now meet, at very high levels, to ‘finish it off’,” he posted on his Truth Social platform.
“Most of the major points are agreed to,” he said.
Mr Putin discussed the “possibility” of direct talks with Ukraine in a meeting with US envoy Steve Witkoff yesterday.
But Mr Zelensky rejected suggestions that Ukraine give up Crimea, and Mr Witkoff’s meeting with Mr Putin came just after a top Russian general was killed in a car bomb attack outside Moscow.
Critics portray Witkoff as being out of his depth
Mr Witkoff had no diplomatic experience before joining Mr Trump’s team in January and critics have portrayed him as out of his depth when pitched into a head-to-head negotiation with Mr Putin, Russia’s paramount leader for the past 25 years.
Video of the start of yesterday’s meeting showed the American, accompanied only by a translator, seated opposite Mr Putin, Kremlin foreign policy aide Yuri Ushakov and Russian investment envoy Kirill Dmitriev, also with an interpreter.
Critics have at times accused Mr Witkoff of echoing the Kremlin’s narrative.
In an interview with journalist Tucker Carlson last month, for example, Mr Witkoff said there was no reason why Russia would want to absorb Ukraine or bite off more of its territory, and it was “preposterous” to think that Mr Putin would want to send his army marching across Europe.
Ukraine and many of its European allies say the opposite.
Mr Putin denies any designs on NATO territory, and Russia has repeatedly cast such charges as evidence of European hostility and “Russophobia”.
Russia accused Ukraine of being behind the car bomb that killed a military general outside Moscow
According to texts seen by Reuters, the peace proposal Mr Witkoff has presented calls for formal US recognition of Russia’s control over Crimea – the Ukrainian peninsula Russia seized and annexed in 2014 – plus de facto recognition of Russia’s hold on areas of southern and eastern Ukraine that its forces control.
A European and Ukrainian document defers detailed discussion about territory until after a ceasefire is concluded, with no mention of recognising Russian control over any Ukrainian territory.
There are also differences over the lifting of sanctions on Russia, the shape of security guarantees for Ukraine and the future size of the Ukrainian military.
Mr Zelensky said this week that recognising Crimea as part of Russia would violate Ukraine’s constitution.
Ukraine denies its forces pushed out of Russia’s Kursk region
Separately, Ukraine’s military has denied an assertion by officials in Moscow that Ukrainian troops had been forced out of their last footholds in Russia’s Kursk region.
The Ukrainian military’s general staff, in a statement posted on social media platform Telegram, said its forces were continuing their operations in some districts of Kursk region.
The general staff also said its incursion into another part of Russia, Belgorod region, was still under way.
