Trump says he does not know if Putin will show up to talks in Turkey
US president Donald Trump on Wednesday said he did not know if Russian President Vladimir Putin would show up for talks on the war in Ukraine planned for Thursday in Turkey.
“He’d like me to be there, and that’s a possibility. . … I don’t know that he would be there if I’m not there. We’re going to find out,” Trump told reporters traveling aboard Air Force One en route to Qatar, according to Reuters.
Trump has said he may visit Turkey for the talks as part of his trip to the Middle East this week.
Key events
Kyiv still has not received an answer from Moscow over whether Russian president Vladimir Putin will travel for potential peace talks in Turkey, a Ukrainian official told Agence France-Presse (AFP) on Wednesday, hours before Moscow said they were due to start.
“President Zelensky made this offer for a Thursday meeting back on Sunday, three days ago,” the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told AFP. “As of Wednesday afternoon, we still haven’t got any response from Putin.”
Pjotr Sauer
Vladimir Putin and Volodymyr Zelenskyy have met only once, in 2019, and Moscow has repeatedly portrayed the Ukrainian leader as illegitimate.
In Istanbul, Ukraine is expected to call for a full 30-day ceasefire as a starting point for further talks.
Moscow has consistently rejected extended ceasefire proposals, arguing they would give Ukraine time to rearm and regroup at a moment when Russian forces are advancing on the battlefield.
Russian officials have indicated they will press for maximalist demands in Istanbul, similar to those made during the failed round of talks in Turkey in spring 2022.
European leaders have promised to increase pressure on Russia if the talks in Turkey failed, but the key question remains whether they can bring Donald Trump onboard with their efforts to tighten the screws on Moscow.
German chancellor Friedrich Merz pledged on Wednesday to build up “the strongest conventional army in Europe” as the continent faces a hostile Russia while the Ukraine war rages on, reports Agence France-Presse (AFP).
“This is appropriate for Europe’s most populous and economically powerful country,” Merz told parliament. “Our friends and partners also expect this from us. Indeed, they practically demand it.”
In his first major address to the Bundestag since his government was inaugurated last week, Merz vowed to “provide all financial means necessary” for the long-underfunded defence forces.
“Our goal is a Germany and a Europe that are so strong together that we never have to use our weapons,” Merz said. “To achieve this, we will have to assume more responsibility within Nato and the EU.”
US president Donald Trump has demanded that Germany and other allies spend more on common defence and thrown into doubt Washington’s future commitment to the transatlantic military alliance.
Merz warned on Wednesday that “anyone who seriously believes that Russia would be satisfied with a victory over Ukraine or with the annexation of parts of the country is mistaken”.
“Strengthening the Bundeswehr [armed forces] is our top priority,” Merz said. “The German government will provide all the financial resources the Bundeswehr needs to become Europe’s strongest conventional army.”
“Strength deters aggressors, while weakness invites aggression,” he added.
He also emphasised continued support for Ukraine but also said that “we are not a party to war, and we don’t want to become one”.
Witkoff and Rubio to go to Turkey on Friday for Russia-Ukraine talks
US president Donald Trump’s envoy Steve Witkoff said he and secretary of state Marco Rubio would travel to Istanbul on Friday for Russia-Ukraine talks.
According to Reuters, Witkoff told reporters in Doha that it was unclear if Russian president Vladimir Putin will attend the planned talks.
Deborah Cole
Three Ukrainian nationals have been arrested on suspicion of plotting parcel bomb attacks in Germany on behalf of the Russian state, prosecutors said.
The German federal prosecutor’s office said on Wednesday that the men, identified only as Vladyslav T, Daniil B and Yevhen B, in line with German privacy rules, had been detained in recent days in Germany and Switzerland.
They are accused of “secret agent activity for sabotage purposes” and of agreeing by, at the latest, March 2025 “with one or several persons presumed to be working for Russian state institutions” to carry out “aggravated arson” and “cause a detonation using explosives”.
The prosecutors alleged the men’s intent had been to carry out “explosives attacks on cargo transport in the Federal Republic of Germany” by shipping parcels from Germany to recipients in Ukraine carrying “explosives or incendiary devices” that would “detonate during transport”.
Vladyslav T allegedly sent two test packages containing GPS trackers in late March from Cologne, in western Germany, “to scout out suitable transport routes” on the orders of Yevhen B, who is believed to have provided the package contents via Daniil B.
Yevhen B, who was arrested on Tuesday in Thurgau, in north-east Switzerland, has been transferred to German custody. German authorities arrested Vladyslav T on Friday in Cologne and Daniil B on Saturday in the south-western city of Konstanz.
Uphold international law on Ukraine or face chaos worldwide, says UN’s Guterres
Failure to achieve a just peace that respects Ukraine’s territorial integrity would undermine international law and cause chaos worldwide, United Nations secretary general António Guterres warned on Wednesday.
“It is extremely important in a moment like this that international law prevails,” he said at a conference in Berlin on the UN’s peacekeeping operations, adding:
Otherwise we are paving the way for chaos around the world.
German defence minister Boris Pistorius added that there were no indications that Russian president Vladimir Putin was seriously considering a ceasefire, reports Reuters.
Pjotr Sauer
The Kremlin is refusing for the third straight day to say if Vladimir Putin will travel to Istanbul on Thursday, or who will represent Russia at the potential peace talks, as international pressure builds on the Russian leader to meet Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
Putin’s spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov, told journalists in Moscow that he would announce the composition of the Russian delegation “once we receive the relevant instructions from the president”.
“So far, no such instructions have been given,” he added.
Zelenskyy challenged Putin to a personal meeting in Turkey after the Russian leader used an unexpected late-night Kremlin address to call for direct Russia-Ukraine negotiations in Istanbul.
Much is still unclear about Thursday’s talks, which are taking on growing importance amid escalating rhetoric and strategic posturing by both Russia and Ukraine.
A senior Russian lawmaker said the makeup of Moscow’s delegation would be made public on Wednesday evening, adding that an all-for-all prisoner exchange could be on the table. “About Istanbul, I won’t say anything, you’ll know everything in the evening,” said Leonid Slutsky.
Meanwhile Zelenskyy, speaking to a small group of journalists including the Guardian, said he would travel to Turkey on Thursday, whether or not Putin flew in for talks.
The foreign ministers of Turkey and Ukraine discussed efforts to reach a ceasefire and lasting peace between Russia and Ukraine, and president Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s planned Ankara visit, during a meeting on Wednesday, a Turkish foreign ministry source said.
Turkish foreign minister Hakan Fidan and Ukrainian foreign minister Andrii Sybiha met ahead of an informal Nato foreign ministers’ meeting in the southern Turkish province of Antalya.
The source said Fidan reiterated Turkey’s readiness to host any Ukraine-Russia peace talks, without elaborating.
Kate Connolly
Speaking to the German parliament right now in what is his first full address, the new chancellor Friedrich Merz has outlined at the start some of the huge challenges facing Germany, and has very quickly steered towards the subject of Ukraine.
He makes clear that Germany will continue on the course of the previous government to support Ukraine against its aggressor, Russia.
“Russia has broken all the rules that have governed our coexistence in Europe since the end of the Second World War, and above all, since overcoming the division of Europe,” he says.
What’s going on in Ukraine, he adds, makes clear that “nothing less than the peaceful order of our entire continent is at stake. In this historic moment of decisiveness, Europe must stand closer together than ever.”
For more than three years, “Russia’s war of aggression has been raging in Ukraine.” The outcome of the war, he says, will not only determine the fate of Ukraine, but also “whether law and order will continue to prevail in Europe and the world, or whether tyranny, military force and the naked right of the strongest will prevail.”
He pledges to continue Germany’s military support of Ukraine, but also to turn Germany’s national military, the Bundeswehr, into the strongest conventional army in Europe by consistently expanding it and investing the necessary resources in it. “We want to be in a position to be able to defend ourselves so that we’re not in a position of having to defend ourselves”.
“Strength deters, weakness invites aggression,” he added, to applause in the full chamber, adding that for Europe’s most populous and economically strongest country, this is “nothing more than appropriate.”
After thanking Germany’s armed forces, he announced the introduction of a “new, attractive, voluntary military service to meet the personnel needs of the armed forces”.
We expect more details on this new development to follow.
A Ukrainian diplomatic source told Reuters on Wednesday that Ukraine’s leadership would decide on its next steps for peace talks in Turkey once there was clarity on Vladimir Putin’s participation.
“Everything will depend on whether Putin is scared of coming to Istanbul or not. Based on his response, the Ukrainian leadership will decide on the next steps,” the source said.
If Putin agrees to join, it would be the first meeting between the leaders of the two warring countries since December 2019.
Direct talks between negotiators from Ukraine and Russia last took place in Istanbul in March 2022, a month after Putin sent tens of thousands of troops into Ukraine.
‘Dictated peace’ in Ukraine would be unacceptable, says Germany’s Merz
German chancellor Friedrich Merz said on Wednesday that there must not be any settlement in Ukraine in the form of a “dictated peace” from Moscow, reports Agence France-Presse (AFP).
Addressing parliament, Merz said there must be “no submission to militarily created facts against Ukraine’s will”.
According to Reuters, Merz also said the west must not allow itself to be divided on Ukraine, adding that he was working to ensure unity between European and US partners on how to end the war.
The west could not accept a submission to the facts achieved on the ground by Russia’s military, he said in his first major speech to parliament since becoming chancellor last week.
“We hope and are working hard to ensure that this clear stance is upheld not only throughout Europe, but also by our American partners,” Merz said.
Ukraine’s leadership will decide on its next steps for peace talks in Turkey once there is clarity on Russian president Vladimir Putin’s participation, a Ukrainian diplomatic source told Reuters on Wednesday.
“Everything will depend on whether Putin is scared of coming to Istanbul or not. Based on his response, the Ukrainian leadership will decide on the next steps,” the source said.
France urges new sanctions to ‘suffocate’ Russian economy
The United States and Europe must put together new sanctions to “suffocate” Russia’s economy in order to force Vladimir Putin to end the war against Ukraine, France’s foreign minister said on Wednesday, reports Agence France-Presse (AFP).
The EU on Wednesday approved a fresh package of sanctions on Russia (see 8.57am BST), but Jean-Noël Barrot sadi that multiple rounds of punitive measures have failed to halt Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, now in its fourth year.
“We will have to go further, because these massive sanctions have not yet deterred Vladimir Putin from continuing his war of aggression against Ukraine,” Barrot told broadcaster BFMTV. He said:
We must prepare to impose devastating sanctions that could suffocate the Russian economy once and for all.
Barrot said that he was to meet US Senator Lindsey Graham in Turkey on Thursday to discuss a US sanctions bill he was working on.
Graham has rallied dozens of lawmakers to support a plan to impose additional sanctions on Moscow as well as tariffs on countries that buy Russian energy. Graham “has designed a package of extremely powerful sanctions”, with tariffs of 500% on countries that continue to import Russian oil, the French foreign minister said.
“Russia has found ways to circumvent the blockade imposed by Europe and the United States,” Barrot said. “Turning off the tap in this way is a way of grabbing Russia by the throat,” he added. “I hope that Europe will in turn be able to impose sanctions on hydrocarbons,” Barrot said.
Trump says he does not know if Putin will show up to talks in Turkey
US president Donald Trump on Wednesday said he did not know if Russian President Vladimir Putin would show up for talks on the war in Ukraine planned for Thursday in Turkey.
“He’d like me to be there, and that’s a possibility. . … I don’t know that he would be there if I’m not there. We’re going to find out,” Trump told reporters traveling aboard Air Force One en route to Qatar, according to Reuters.
Trump has said he may visit Turkey for the talks as part of his trip to the Middle East this week.
Putin has invitation to visit Iran, but dates have yet to be set, Kremlin says
Russian president Vladimir Putin has an invitation to visit Iran, but the dates have not yet been agreed, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said on Wednesday, according to Reuters.
Iran’s government spokesperson Fatemeh Mohajerani was quoted by Russian state news agency RIA Novosti on Tuesday as saying that Putin’s visit to Iran “is currently being worked out”.
Moscow and Tehran signed a 20-year strategic partnership agreement in January, the two countries have supplied each other with weapons, and Russia has defended what it says is Tehran’s right to peaceful nuclear energy.
“Indeed, President Putin has an invitation to pay an official or working visit to Iran. The dates have not yet been agreed. As soon as they are agreed, we will inform you,” Peskov told reporters when asked about a possible visit. He added:
We highly value our partnership with this country and we highly value the depth of our relationship in a wide variety of areas.
The last time Putin visited Iran was in 2022, months after he sent tens of thousands of troops into Ukraine.
Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, yesterday restated his commitment to meet Russia’s president for peace talks in Turkey, saying it would be a test of the Kremlin’s dedication to pursuing peace.
Zelenskyy said he planned to wait for Putin in Ankara with the Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, adding that they would travel to Istanbul if Putin opted to hold the talks there. ‘We will do everything to make this meeting happen,’ he said.
You can listen to Zelenskyy’s comments in the video below:
