Trump says Putin wants to meet, arrangements already underway

U.S. President-elect Donald Trump said on Jan. 9 that Russian President Vladimir Putin wants to meet with him, and that preparations for the meeting are underway.

“He wants to meet, and we are setting it up,” Trump told reporters at his Mar-a-Lago residence in Florida.

“President Putin wants to meet. He has said that even publicly and we have to get that war over with. That’s a bloody mess.”

Trump did not provide any further details on the upcoming meeting.

The claim comes days before Trump is set to take office on Jan. 20. Throughout his presidential campaign, Trump promised to negotiate a swift end to the war in Ukraine, often referring to his good relationship with Putin.

Trump revises Ukraine peace timeline, FT reports

“The whole [Trump] team is obsessed with strength and looking strong, so they’re recalibrating the Ukraine approach,” one European official told the Financial Times.

The Kyiv IndependentOlena Goncharova