President Trump’s Talks with the Leaders of Russia and Ukraine

0:00President Donald Trump:Today on State of the World, President Trump talks with the leaders of Russia and Ukraine. You're listening to State of the World from NPR. We bring you the day's most vital international stories up close where they're happening. It's Tuesday, August 19th. I'm Greg Dixon. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Ukraine was at the White House yesterday, along with seven other European leaders, for discussions with President Trump about ways to end Russia's war in Ukraine. Zelensky received a friendly greeting from Trump, in contrast to a tense White House encounter between the two back in February. This summit followed a meeting between Trump and Russia's president, Vladimir Putin, in Alaska last week.

0:44President Donald Trump:In today's episode, we're going to hear what was discussed and what each side is looking for in a path towards peace. In a few minutes, we'll hear from a man who was recently Ukraine's foreign minister. First, NPR's Charles Maines in Moscow tells us how the Kremlin is reacting to yesterday's meeting. He spoke to Leila Fadal. OK, let's start with this idea of security guarantees for Ukraine. How can we expect that will be received by the Kremlin?

1:11NPR correspondent in Moscow:You know, well, hammering out the contours of these security agreements for Ukraine is seen by the West as key to any future peace deal. And Trump began by saying that Putin was on board with it. In a very significant step, President Putin agreed that Russia would accept security guarantees for Ukraine. And this is one of the key points that we need to consider. And now Trump has said that that could involve Europe taking on a lot of the burden. That's a quote. But with some American support, which is obviously quite vague. So we heard several proposals out yesterday. Some argued that Ukraine should have what's called NATO-like Article 5 protections.

1:47NPR correspondent in Moscow:The idea that an armed attack against one would be considered an attack against all. Others were calling for Western boots on the ground as peace monitors. One slightly more concrete security guarantee, President Zelensky of Ukraine confirmed that a Financial Times report that Kiev wants to buy 100 billion, that's with a B, dollars in American weapons for its own future defense. Now, Trump and Zelensky are calling for direct talks with Vladimir Putin. What's the Kremlin saying? Yeah, in the middle of yesterday's talks, Trump broke off for a phone call in Moscow with Putin, where Trump says Putin agreed to meet with Zelensky and also in this trilateral meeting.

2:22NPR correspondent in Moscow:Now, late last night, Putin's aide, Yuri Ushakov, confirmed Putin and Trump had talked for some 40 minutes. And Ushakov said, and I'll quote here, the possibility of raising the level of direct contacts between Moscow and Kiev was discussed. So you can take that however you like. Zelensky later gave his version in more succinct terms. Let's listen. Russia proposed a two-final meeting. So here Zelensky said Russia had called for a one-on-one meeting with Putin and Zelensky before a follow-on meeting that would include Trump as well. And Zelensky had accepted, he said, that only on the level of leaders could the most painful and important issues be discussed.

2:58NPR correspondent in Moscow:And this presumably would mean these discussions about possible future land concessions, or swaps in President Trump's words, as well as the return of prisoners and children abducted by Russia. But in terms of when, where, that's all to be determined. Germany's chancellor said it could happen by the end of the month. And how do you see these demands going over in Moscow? Well, you know, as we heard, Trump says Putin is open to security guarantees for Ukraine. But I think one thing we've seen time and time again is that Trump is moving fast and operating in broad agreements, whereas Putin likes to zero in on details, which slows the process down.

3:32NPR correspondent in Moscow:Critics would say by design so the fighting can continue. I will say I heard a lot of red lines from Russian red lines in the discussions in Washington yesterday. This idea of European troops on the ground in Ukraine, well, Russia's ruled that out categorically. Talk of Article 5-like status for Ukraine. Well, Ukraine's desire to join NATO was one of the reasons Putin launched the full-scale invasion in the first place. And even Zelensky's calls for arms sales would seem to fly in the face of Putin's demands for Ukraine's demilitarization. So we'll see. But there's a lot of skepticism here, both from analysts and even pro-war nationalists, that Putin would or even could bend on these issues.

4:08President Donald Trump:It's NPR's Charles Maines in Moscow. Now for Ukrainian reaction to events. We're going to hear from Dmitry Kuleba. He was Ukraine's foreign minister from 2020 until 2024. And he spoke to A. Martinez. Foreign minister, do you believe anything is different today after yesterday's meeting? Well, one thing is clearly different. we avoided a clash between President Trump on the one hand and President Zelensky and other European leaders on the other hand. That's good news that they had a constructive conversation. But when it comes to substance, to meaningful, tangible outcomes of the meeting, everything is very vague.

4:48And there is more, I would say, fog than clarity on possible parameters of future agreement. Yeah, I was going to ask you how you thought President Zelensky did, considering that the February meeting in the White House did not seem to go well. But if that is the most hopeful you are, foreign minister, I mean, that seems like it's bare bones in terms of hopefulness that something can resolve itself anytime soon. Well, a long journey starts with the first step. And I was pretty certain that this meeting would go well because back in February, both sides went too far and they both realized that afterwards.

5:31So but it's very important that the idea of a meeting between leaders is still open. It's very important that there will be follow up conversations on what security guarantees may look like. To be honest, it's very hard to imagine what kind of security guarantees will be put in place to deter Russia from further invasions. But still, this conversation is important. But again, as I said, nothing is agreed until everything is agreed. And in this particular case, nothing has been agreed yet. It's just a conversation, an important one. And all anything can do is just imagine what those security guarantees might be, because no concrete details have really been put out there.

6:17But I'm wondering if indeed, as President Trump says, a meeting between Zelensky and Putin happens next. Can a peace deal happen without a ceasefire? That will be very hard to imagine, but we should always reserve some space for the magic of diplomacy. But what President Putin is trying to achieve, he has repeatedly stated that he wants to remove the causes of the conflict. And although he claims that one of the key causes is Ukraine's aspiration to become a member of NATO, this is not entirely true. His real cause is the existence of Ukraine's statehood because he wants to dismantle Ukraine as a nation.

6:58And as long as he will not change this goal from unlimited to limited, as long as he does not abandon this goal, there will be a war of a certain level of intensity. There may be ceasefires and they will be broken, but we need a decision that will clearly make Putin understand that the goal of dismantling Ukrainian statehood is unattainable for him. Then peace will come. How likely is that, though, that he would abandon this goal, considering that it's seemingly been a belief of his even before Russia invaded Ukraine back in 2022? Well, that's the most difficult question to ask. It's even more complicated than how potential security guarantees may look like.

7:46We should build a construction around Ukraine, a security and political construction, whereas it will be accepted as part of the West. and Putin will have to accept the fact that Ukraine does not belong to his sphere of influence anymore. Is this possible? Yes. Can you achieve that with one or two decisions? No. It must be a network, a complex of decisions that will build this wall between Ukraine and Russia and we will be living our lives separately. Does a timeline matter for you right now, considering it seems like there's momentum happening? Is that something that's tangible? Or at this point, it's been already so long that who cares how long it takes?

8:31Listen, I live in Ukraine and I experienced all the drone and missile attacks together with my co-patriots. And trust me, there is nothing that you want more than for all of this to end as soon as possible, because it's a nightmare. It's a daily nightmare. But we know what we are fighting for, and we will keep fighting if this is the only option that we are left with. Dmitry Kuleba is a former foreign minister of Ukraine. Thank you very much for your thoughts on this.

9:14President Donald Trump:That's the State of the World from NPR. Thanks for listening.