Putin says Russia-Ukraine war ‘wouldn’t have happened’ if Trump were US president

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday claimed that the Russia-Ukraine conflict would probably not have happened if US President Donald Trump had been in office in 2022, echoing a point Trump has repeatedly made.

Speaking at a joint press conference, Putin said he had tried to warn then-US President Joe Biden against allowing the situation to escalate to full-scale hostilities. “In 2022, during our last contact with the previous administration, I tried to convince my American colleague that the situation should not be brought to the point of no return,” he said, calling the eventual invasion “a big mistake.”

Putin added that he and Trump had established a “very good, business-like and trusting contact,” suggesting that the former president would have prevented the war. Ahead of the summit, Trump had warned of “severe consequences” if Russia did not agree to a ceasefire.

Trump said on Saturday Ukraine should agree a deal to end the war with Russia because “Russia is a very big power, and they’re not”, after holding a summit with President Vladimir Putin that failed to yield a ceasefire.

In a major shift, Trump also said he had agreed with Putin that the best way to end the war was to go straight to a peace settlement – not via a ceasefire, as Ukraine and its European allies, until now with US support, have been demanding.

Trump’s comments came after he met Putin for nearly three hours in Alaska on Friday at the first U.S.-Russia summit since Moscow launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.

“It was determined by all that the best way to end the horrific war between Russia and Ukraine is to go directly to a Peace Agreement, which would end the war, and not a mere Ceasefire Agreement, which often times do not hold up,” Trump posted on Truth social.

The war – the deadliest in Europe for 80 years – has killed or wounded well over a million people from both sides, including thousands of mostly Ukrainian civilians, according to analysts.

Trump said he would hold talks at the White House with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Monday, adding: “If all works out, we will then schedule a meeting with President Putin. Potentially, millions of people’s lives will be saved.”

Zelenskyy said after a lengthy conversation with Trump following the Alaska summit that Ukraine was ready for constructive cooperation, and he supported the idea of a trilateral meeting.

“Ukraine reaffirms its readiness to work with maximum effort to achieve peace,” he wrote on social media.

But Putin made no mention of meeting Zelenskyy when speaking to reporters earlier. Russian state news agency TASS quoted Putin’s foreign policy aide Yuri Ushakov as saying the possibility of a three-way summit including Zelenskyy had not been discussed.

With inputs from agencies