U.S. President Donald Trump has announced the cancellation of a planned summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin, citing Moscow’s refusal to agree to a ceasefire along Ukraine’s current front line.
Speaking at the White House on Tuesday, Trump said he had decided to scrap the meeting — which was expected to take place in Budapest within weeks — after concluding that “there was no progress” toward a meaningful deal to end the war.
“I don’t want a wasted meeting,” Trump told reporters. “I said: cut and stop at the battle line. Go home. Stop fighting, stop killing people.”
A White House official later confirmed that there were “no plans for a Trump–Putin meeting in the immediate future,” underscoring widening gaps between Washington and Moscow over how to bring the 32-month conflict to a halt.
The cancelled summit was part of a renewed diplomatic push to secure a ceasefire that would freeze the conflict along existing battle lines — a proposal backed by Kyiv and European allies, but firmly rejected by the Kremlin.
Russia has demanded the withdrawal of Ukrainian forces from the Donbas region and formal recognition of its sovereignty over the area — conditions that Kyiv and its Western partners have deemed unacceptable.
“Russia’s position remains unchanged,” Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Tuesday, insisting Moscow seeks a “long-term, sustainable peace” rather than what he described as a “temporary truce that ignores the root causes of the war.”
A preparatory meeting between U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Lavrov, initially scheduled to set the stage for the Trump–Putin summit, was also called off. The two, however, held what Washington described as a “productive” phone conversation instead.
Trump’s decision marks the second time in months that high-level talks with Putin have collapsed. The two leaders last met during a brief summit in Alaska in August, which ended without a breakthrough.
U.S. officials say the latest breakdown came after a tense phone call between Trump and Putin last week, shortly before Trump met Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. Sources familiar with the conversation said Trump urged Ukraine to consider ceding parts of Donetsk and Luhansk — collectively known as the Donbas — in exchange for a ceasefire.
Zelensky has rejected that idea outright.
“Ukraine will not surrender the territory it still controls,” Zelensky told European leaders in a joint statement. “Giving up our land would only embolden Russia to continue its aggression.”
European leaders backed Zelensky’s stance, insisting that any peace process must begin with an immediate freeze of the front line to stop further bloodshed.
The failed summit discussions coincided with reports that Washington was considering sending long-range Tomahawk missiles to Ukraine — a potential shift in U.S. military support that some analysts believe spurred Moscow’s sudden diplomatic outreach.
Zelensky hinted as much during his visit to Washington, describing the missile talks as a “strong investment in diplomacy.”
“Sometimes, the language of strength is the only one Russia understands,” the Ukrainian leader said, adding that while he left Washington without a firm arms deal, the conversation had “changed the tone” of the peace debate.
With the planned Trump–Putin meeting now off the table, diplomatic efforts to end the war appear to be at another impasse.
Western officials fear that as winter approaches, the conflict may once again escalate — with both sides digging in, and the path to peace growing ever more uncertain.
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