Putin proposes Ukraine summit with Trump and Xi, without Zelensky

Russian President Vladimir Putin has proposed a summit with US President Donald Trump and Chinese leader Xi Jinping to negotiate an end to the war in Ukraine, without Ukraine's participation, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing people familiar with the discussions. The Kremlin suggested holding the talks on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Shenzhen, China, on 18 and 19 November.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov confirmed to the newspaper that a possible meeting was being discussed. "There are no clear ideas yet about the meeting itself or its possible agenda, although all three parties acknowledge the hypothetical possibility that such a meeting could take place," Peskov said. A senior US official told the Journal that Trump had not yet agreed to such a summit but could be open to the idea.

The Journal reported, citing a former Russian intelligence official familiar with the matter, that Putin's proposal follows a phone call with Trump on 9 October, during which the two leaders also agreed a deal on Russian diesel exports to the United States. Trump separately lifted major sanctions against Moscow by decree on Friday.

Ukraine's foreign minister, Andrii Sybiha, rejected the idea on social media, saying a summit between Russia, China and the US, without Ukraine, would "encourage Putin to continue the war," unlike a three-way meeting between Ukraine, the US and Russia, which he said could help end it sooner. "[Putin] is not a world leader, he is a war criminal. Russia is not a global power, it is a global problem," Sybiha wrote.

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, speaking to reporters during a visit to Uzbekistan, said a meeting was being discussed but that he did not know if it had been definitively agreed. He separately denied Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky's claim that Washington had briefly paused intelligence-sharing with Kyiv. "I don't know where he's getting these things from or why he's telling the press this. There was no pause," Rubio said, according to Mediafax. Rubio also warned of a "very real risk" that the war could spread to another country, through a failed sabotage attempt or a drone straying across a border while being jammed by electronic warfare.