US President Donald Trump pushed for a quick halt to the Ukraine war in a Thursday phone call with Vladimir Putin, while a Kremlin aide said the Russian president reiterated that Moscow would keep pushing to solve the conflict's "root causes."
The two leaders did not discuss a recent pause in some US weapons shipments to Kyiv during the nearly hour-long call, according to a readout provided by Putin aide Yuri Ushakov. Within hours of the call, an apparent Russian drone attack sparked a fire in an apartment building in a northern suburb of Kyiv, Ukrainian officials said, indicating little change in the trajectory of the conflict immediately after the call.
In Kyiv itself, Reuters witnesses reported explosions and sustained heavy machine gun fire as air defense units battled drones over the capital.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, meanwhile, told reporters in Denmark that he hopes to speak to Trump as soon as Friday about the ongoing pause in some weapons shipments, which was first disclosed earlier this week.
Trump, who was due to speak at a campaign-style event in Iowa later in the day, did not comment on the conversation with Putin, but he said on social media beforehand that he would speak to the Russian leader.
"Root causes" has become Russian shorthand for the issue of NATO enlargement and Western support for Ukraine, including the rejection of any notion of Ukraine joining the NATO alliance. Russian leaders are also angling to establish greater control over political decisions made in Kyiv and other eastern European capitals, NATO leaders have said.
The diplomatic back-and-forth comes as the US has paused shipments of certain critical weapons to Ukraine due to low stockpiles, sources earlier told Reuters, just as Ukraine faces a Russian summer offensive and frequent attacks on civilian targets.
That decision led to Ukraine calling in the acting US envoy to Kyiv on Wednesday to underline the importance of military aid from Washington, and caution that the move would weaken Ukraine's ability to defend against intensifying Russian airstrikes and battlefield advances.
The Pentagon's move led in part to a cut in deliveries of Patriot air defense missiles that Ukraine relies on to destroy fast-moving ballistic missiles, Reuters reported on Wednesday.
Ushakov, the Kremlin aide, said the issue of weapons deliveries to Ukraine did not come up during the Trump-Putin phone call.
Ushakov added that while Russia was open to continuing to speak with the US, any peace negotiations needed to occur between Moscow and Kyiv.
That comment comes amid some indications that Moscow is trying to avoid a trilateral format for any peace negotiations. The Russians asked American diplomats to leave the room during such a meeting in Istanbul in early June, Ukrainian officials have said.
Trump and Putin did not talk about a face-to-face meeting, Ushakov said.
