Donald Trump discussed the war in Ukraine on Wednesday in phone calls with Russian President Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, the new US president’s first big step towards diplomacy over a war he has promised to end.
President Volodymyr Zelensky said Ukraine would need the US to help it build up an army as big as that of Russia to serve as a Plan B if his country was not admitted into the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (Nato).
The US was freeing a Russian cybercrime boss from prison in return for Moscow’s release of US schoolteacher Marc Fogel, said a US official on Wednesday.
Trump discusses Ukraine war with Putin, Zelensky
Donald Trump discussed the war in Ukraine on Wednesday in phone calls with Russian President Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, the new US president’s first big step towards diplomacy over a war he has promised to end.
In a post on his social media platform, Trump said he and Putin had “agreed to have our respective teams start negotiations immediately, and we will begin by calling President Zelensky, of Ukraine, to inform him of the conversation, something which I will be doing right now”.
Zelensky’s office said Trump and Zelensky had spoken by phone for about an hour.
The Kremlin said Putin and Trump had agreed to meet, and Putin had invited Trump to visit Moscow.
Trump has long said he would quickly end the war in Ukraine, without saying how he would accomplish this.
Earlier on Wednesday, Trump’s defence secretary, Pete Hegseth, said a return to Ukraine’s pre-2014 borders was unrealistic and the US administration did not see Nato membership for Kyiv as part of a solution to the war.
Speaking at a meeting of Ukraine’s military allies at Nato headquarters in Brussels on Wednesday, Hegseth delivered the clearest and bluntest public statement so far on the new US administration’s approach to the nearly three-year-old war.
“We want, like you, a sovereign and prosperous Ukraine. But we must start by recognising that returning to Ukraine’s pre-2014 borders is an unrealistic objective,” Hegseth told a meeting of Ukraine and more than 40 allies at Nato headquarters in Brussels.
“Chasing this illusionary goal will only prolong the war and cause more suffering.”
No peace talks have been held since the early months of the war, now approaching its third anniversary. Former US President Joe Biden and most Western leaders held no direct discussions with Putin after Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
Ukraine succeeded in the war’s first year in pushing Russian forces back from the outskirts of Kyiv and recapturing swathes of Russian-occupied territory.
But Moscow has mostly had the upper hand on the battlefield since a failed Ukrainian counteroffensive in 2023, making slow but steady gains in intense fighting that has killed or injured hundreds of thousands of troops on both sides and laid Ukrainian cities to waste.
Russia occupies around a fifth of Ukraine and has demanded Kyiv cede more territory and be rendered permanently neutral under any peace deal. Ukraine demands Russia withdraw from captured territory and wants Nato membership or equivalent security guarantees to prevent Moscow from attacking again.
Ukraine will need US help to boost army if it can’t join Nato - Zelensky
Zelensky said Ukraine would need the US to help it build up an army as big as that of Russia to serve as a Plan B if his country was not admitted into the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (Nato).
Kyiv, which has been locked in an all-out war with invading Russian forces since February 2022, has said that joining Nato would be the strongest, cheapest way to prevent Russia from launching a new invasion on it after a ceasefire or peace deal is reached.
“If Ukraine is not in Nato, it means that Ukraine will build Nato on its territory. So we need an army as numerous as the Russians have today,” said Zelensky in an interview with The Economist published on Wednesday.
“And for all this, we need weapons and money. And we will ask the US for this,” said Zelensky, describing that as his Plan B.
Washington is among several Nato members opposed to Ukraine joining Nato currently.
Russia to get back jailed cybercrime boss from US
The US was freeing a Russian cybercrime boss from prison in return for Moscow’s release of US schoolteacher Marc Fogel, said a US official on Wednesday.
The Kremlin said the deal — the first it has struck with the new administration of Trump — could help build trust between the two countries.
But it played down Trump’s suggestion that the agreement could make a significant contribution towards ending the Russia-Ukraine war which he has pledged to bring to a swift conclusion.
A US administration official confirmed to Reuters that Alexander Vinnik, a crypto-hacker, was being released. Vinnik has to forfeit more than $100-million to the US government and he was currently in northern California awaiting transportation back to Russia, said the official.
Trump and other administration officials said a second American would be released on Wednesday but did not elaborate.
Vinnik was arrested in Greece in 2017 and subsequently extradited to the US, where he pleaded guilty in May 2024 to conspiracy to commit money laundering.
He operated a cryptocurrency exchange, BTC-e, through which he was suspected of funnelling $4-billion in proceeds from ransomware attacks, identity theft, drug rings and other criminal activity.
Fogel (63) was serving a 14-year sentence for drug smuggling after being caught at a Moscow airport with a small amount of marijuana. He was flown on Tuesday to Washington, where he celebrated his release with Trump at the White House.
Trump said the deal “could be a big important part” of ending the three-year-old war in Ukraine.
Asked about that comment, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said any agreement on releasing prisoners was the result of “very, very meticulous negotiating work.
"Of course, such agreements are hardly capable of becoming a breakthrough moment but at the same time, bit by bit, these are steps to build mutual trust, which is now at its lowest point.”
Russia able to fight on in Ukraine for another year, say military experts
Russia had what it needed to fight on in Ukraine for at least another year and retained the battlefield initiative, but was struggling to replace its destroyed tanks, said experts at a leading security research organisation on Wednesday.
In what has become a war of attrition now nearing its three-year mark, both sides are sustaining heavy casualties as Moscow’s forces slowly but steadily advance at a time when the scale and nature of any future US military aid to Kyiv remain unclear under Trump.
For now at least, Russia is in a stronger position than Ukraine on the battlefield despite Kyiv seriously reducing the once formidable Russian Black Sea Fleet’s room for manoeuvre, said experts at the London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS).
“[With] attrition being such an important factor on land, Russia has the initiative and Ukraine is fighting a defensive land battle,” said IISS senior land warfare analyst Ben Barry.
“Without any ceasefire, the most likely contour of the war over the next few months is more of the same. More bloody attrition on land with very heavy casualties on both sides. If Russia wishes to prolong the war I judge it has the potential human, equipment and logistical resources to continue to do so through the rest of this year.”
In its annual assessment of military capabilities, the IISS said that Moscow’s total defence spending was higher than total European defence spending in purchasing-power-parity terms.
It said Russia also appeared better able to maintain the size of its military than Ukraine.
“While Russia appears to be able to sustain the manning of its forces, evidence suggests that Ukraine, which generally kept its casualty figures secret, has suffered a serious drain on its personnel — with many ground units under-strength,” said the report.
Ukraine’s Defence Ministry this week launched a recruitment drive to attract 18-to-24-year-olds to military service for a year in an attempt to address its manpower problem.
Russia, the report said, had a serious tank and armoured vehicle problem which meant it was taking heavier personnel losses on the battlefield.
Moscow lost 1,400 tanks in 2024 and is struggling to make new tanks at a fast enough rate to replace the old ones despite increasing production of advanced models like the T-90M tank.
“Russia is increasingly trading quality for quantity to support its war effort,” said the report.
Minerals deal will give Kyiv post-war ‘security shield’, says Trump official
US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said on Wednesday that a minerals deal between Kyiv and Washington would provide Ukraine with a post-war “security shield”, and Zelensky said he hoped to reach an agreement within days.
Bessent, the first cabinet-level official on Trump’s team to visit Kyiv, spoke after Zelensky said he was ready to do a deal to open mineral resources to US investment, as he vies for the US president’s backing in the war against Russia.
Trump, who wants a rapid end to the war but has not made clear if he will continue vital military aid to Kyiv, has said he wants $500-billion in rare earth minerals from Ukraine and that Washington’s support needs to be “secured”.
Zelensky told reporters that the US had on Wednesday presented Ukraine with a first draft agreement, which Kyiv would now study, and that he hoped they could seal a deal at the February 14-16 Munich Security Conference.
“We had a productive, constructive conversation. For me, the issue of security guarantees for Ukraine is very important, and we talked about minerals in general,” said Zelensky, who is expected to meet US Vice-President JD Vance in Munich.
Bessent said the minerals deal was part of a “larger peace deal that Trump has in mind”, adding that his first visit to Ukraine showed that the war was a top priority for the Trump administration.
Russia braces for oil output cuts as sanctions and drones hit
Russia may be forced to throttle back its oil output in the coming months as US sanctions hamper its access to tankers to sail to Asia and Ukrainian drone attacks hobble its refineries.
The US imposed sanctions last month that targeted 180 Russian tankers while Kyiv has stepped up drone attacks to improve its bargaining position amid expectations that Trump will press Putin to negotiate an end to the war in Ukraine.
Reuters has spoken to three oil executives and more than 10 traders, refining executives, and port agents about the impact of these latest sanctions.
Three Russian oil executives, asking not to be named due to the sensitivity of the issue, said the reality was clear: Russia will have no choice but to slow oil production.
There was a growing glut of crude in Russia due to falling exports and reduced refining production which could only be addressed by lowering output, they said. Russia has little storage capacity and Ukraine has attacked some of these facilities with drones in recent weeks.
The output cuts could start small, with Russia’s production slipping below nine million barrels per day (bpd) in the coming months, but may accelerate if tanker shortages and refining outages persist, said the executives. DM