Ukraine must make a deal to end the war with Russia because "Russia is a very big power and Ukraine is not".
This was stated by US President Donald Trump in his conversation with his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelensky after hosting a summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
This was reported by "Reuters", citing its own sources.
Trump said that the Russian leader had offered to freeze most of the front lines if Kiev forces surrendered all of Donetsk, the industrial region that is one of Moscow's main targets.
Zelensky rejected the request, according to the source. Russia now controls a fifth of Ukraine, including about three-quarters of the Donetsk region, which it first entered in 2014.
Trump also said he agreed with Putin that a peace deal should be sought without the preliminary ceasefire that Ukraine and its European allies, so far backed by the United States, have demanded.
Zelensky said he would meet Trump in Washington on Monday, while Kiev's European allies welcomed Trump's efforts but vowed to support Ukraine and tighten sanctions on Russia. The source said European leaders have also been invited to attend those talks.
Trump's meeting with Putin in Alaska on Friday, the first summit between the United States and Russia since Moscow began a war in Ukraine in February 2022, lasted just three hours.
"Everyone decided that the best way to end the horrific war between Russia and Ukraine was to move directly to a peace agreement that would end the war, not just a ceasefire agreement, which is often not valid," Trump wrote on Truth Social.