Daijiworld Media Network – Washington

Washington, Oct 20: US President Donald Trump reportedly pressed Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to accept Russian terms for ending the war during a White House meeting on Friday, warning that Russian President Vladimir Putin threatened to “destroy” Ukraine if it did not comply, according to the Financial Times.

During the discussion, Trump allegedly insisted that Zelensky surrender the entire eastern Donbas region to Russia, echoing talking points made by Putin in a call a day earlier. However, Ukraine managed to steer Trump toward supporting a freeze of the current frontline, a compromise both leaders acknowledged after the meeting. Trump said the war should stop at the existing battle lines, which Zelensky called “an important point.”

Zelensky had arrived at the White House seeking military support to continue the fight, but found a US president focused on brokering a peace deal.

The report also noted that in a Thursday call, Putin offered Ukraine some small areas in the southern Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions in exchange for larger parts of Donbas under Ukrainian control, a reduced demand compared to his original 2024 insistence that Kyiv cede the entirety of Donbas plus Kherson and Zaporizhzhia, totaling nearly 20,000 square km.

Trump and Putin have agreed to a second summit on Ukraine in the coming weeks, provisionally in Budapest, following an August 15 meeting in Alaska that failed to yield a breakthrough.