'Maybe they will, maybe they won't': Trump voices doubt over Zelenskyy-Putin talks

President Donald Trump is signaling fresh doubts about whether Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Russian President Vladimir Putin will meet anytime soon.

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump is signaling fresh doubts about whether Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Russian President Vladimir Putin will meet anytime soon as momentum toward a summit between the warring countries appears to be fading.

“I don’t know that they’ll meet — maybe they will, maybe they won’t,” Trump said Monday at the White House during a meeting in the Oval Office with South Korean leader Lee Jae-myung. “It’s going to be up to them. It takes two to tango. I always say it. And they should meet, I think, before I have a meeting and probably close the deal, but I think it’s appropriate.”

Trump praised Putin for traveling to the United States for talks, a move he said Putin was reluctant to make, but he acknowledged that the efforts to broker peace seem to have slowed.

That marks a shift in tone just over a week after Trump hosted Putin in Alaska for a whirlwind summit aimed at breaking through the three-year stalemate in the Russia-Ukraine war. Trump had initially suggested that back-to-back meetings between the key parties could occur within a matter of days or weeks.

But he conceded Monday that organizing the meetings has proven more challenging than he anticipated and described the fight as “personal” for both leaders and rooted in deep animosity.