Donald Trump says he hopes Vladimir Putin is “going to be good” and rules out sending US troops to Ukraine as part of a security guarantee after talks at the White House with Volodymyr Zelenskyy and European leaders last night. Follow the latest.
Tuesday 19 August 2025 15:15, UK
Security analyst Michael Clarke is back tomorrow afternoon to answer all your Ukraine war questions after a significant flurry of diplomacy in the past week.
Will Donald Trump’s meetings with Vladimir Putin and Volodymyr Zelenskyy come to anything? Is a ceasefire now a non-starter? Are Moscow’s forces pushing for territorial gains to gain the upper hand in negotiations? 
Submit your question for Clarke in the box at the top of the page and join us tomorrow at 12pm.
Hungary’s leader has had his latest say on efforts to bring Russia’s war on Ukraine to an end.
Viktor Orban – historically a Vladimir Putin ally – said the “danger of a third world war can only be reduced through a Trump-Putin meeting”.
He also appeared to contradict Antonio Costa, the president of the EU Council, who said just a short while ago Ukraine’s EU membership needs to be advanced (see 14.17).
“It has been confirmed that Ukraine’s membership in the European Union provides no security guarantees; therefore, linking membership with security guarantees is unnecessary and dangerous,” Orban wrote on social media.
“Hungary welcomes the steps taken at the Trump-Putin talks and supports the continuation of the negotiation process, with particular regard to a second Trump-Putin meeting.
“We are keeping the Hungarian initiative on the agenda for the Union to propose a Europe-Russia summit as soon as possible.”
Donald Trump said a little while ago the UK is one of at least three European countries that “want to have boots on the ground” to secure a peace for Ukraine – see our 13.17 post. 
Earlier, however, a UK minister told us it’s “premature” to say UK troops will be directly involved.
But the country does need to play its part, he added.
“What’s clear is that we and 30 other countries now, including the United States, need to be prepared to play our part in providing those security guarantees,” pensions minister Torsten Bell told our presenter Wilfred Frost.
“We can’t ask the Ukrainian people to sign up to a system of just trusting President Putin after the illegal invasion three years ago, actions long before that. 
“Nobody in Ukraine is going to trust promises from President Putin.
“If we want to see a meaningful peace, it will need to involve meaningful guarantees.”
Downing Street has released a statement after Sir Keir Starmer and Emmanuel Macron chaired a virtual meeting of more than 30 leaders from the coalition of the willing this morning to update them on last night’s talks.
“The prime minister began by reflecting on the constructive meeting, saying it was clear there was a real sense of unity and shared goal of securing a just and lasting peace for Ukraine,” a spokesman said.
“Turning to next steps, the prime minister outlined that coalition of the willing planning teams would meet with their US counterparts in the coming days to further strengthen plans to deliver robust security guarantees and prepare for the deployment of a reassurance force if the hostilities ended.
“The leaders also discussed how further pressure – including through sanctions – could be placed on Putin until he showed he was ready to take serious action to end his illegal invasion.
“The prime minister said he looked forward to updating the group again soon, as further work progressed in the coming days and weeks.”
The European Council’s president is talking about Ukraine’s security now. 
“Now is the time to accelerate our practical work to put in place a guarantee similar to NATO’s Article 5 with continued United States engagement,” Antonio Costa said.
But Ukraine’s military has to be the “first line of defence”, he added.
Costa said the main security guarantee – a key topic of discussion since Donald Trump’s talks with Vladimir Putin on Friday – must be for Ukraine to have armed forces capable of defending its sovereignty. 
He’s also touched on the need to advance on trilateral talks – which would involve Trump, Putin and Volodymyr Zelenskyy – and on Ukraine’s EU membership.
We’re hearing from president of the European Council, Antonio Costa, after those talks in Washington last night.
He is speaking after European leaders held a virtual debrief earlier this hour (see 12.19 post).
Watch live in the live stream at the top of the page. We’ll bring you any developments.
Ukrainians are not going to accept just a diplomatic solution to the war, our military analyst Sean Bell has said.
He explained that a peace deal has got to “have teeth” and be something that causes Vladimir Putin to think twice over invading the country again.
Watch his full analysis below…
Donald Trump says he “purposefully didn’t” read the letter handed to him by Volodymyr Zelenskyy yesterday.
Ukraine’s president gave Trump a letter from his wife addressed to Melania Trump.
That came after the first lady of the United States wrote a letter to Putin, which Trump handed to him on Friday.
Speaking about the letter from Olena Zelenska, Trump tells Fox News it was handed to him sealed.
“Melania told me it was absolutely a beautiful letter,” he says.
“It was a beautiful letter I’m sure.”
Donald Trump is speaking to Fox News and says he hopes Vladimir Putin “is going to be good”.
“If he’s not, it’s going to be a rough situation,” he says on the phone call, adding, however, that “it’s possible the Russian president might not want to make a deal”.
The US president says he thinks Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Putin are “doing okay”.
Asked about the prospect of security guarantees for Ukraine, Trump says European nations “are going to frontload it”.
“They want to have boots on the ground,” he adds, referring to France, Germany and the UK. “I don’t think it’s going to be a problem.”
When asked about whether he can give assurances there won’t be US boots on the ground, Trump says “you have my assurance and I’m president”, adding: “I’m just trying to stop people being killed.”
During the wide-ranging phone interview, Trump suggests US support for Ukraine’s security could come in the form of air power.
The US president also says he always thought that Ukraine was a “buffer” between Russia and Europe.
Trump says he had a “very good call” with Putin after his meeting with Zelenskyy and European leaders yesterday.
“I didn’t do it in front of them, I thought it would have been disrespectful to President Putin,” he says.
“Putin wouldn’t talk to the people from Europe.”
Russia’s foreign minister has insisted Moscow’s aims have been to protect its own people – rather than seizing land.
In comments on the Rossiya-1 state TV channel, Sergei Lavrov added territorial changes “are very often an integral component of reaching agreements”.
He said that, as fears grow in Ukraine and among allies, a potential peace deal would leave territory occupied by Russia in Moscow’s hands.
“We have never talked about the fact that we simply need to seize some territories,” he said.
“Neither Crimea, nor Donbas, nor Novorossiya as territories have ever been our goal, our goal was to protect people, Russian people, who have lived on these lands for centuries.”
“Everyone knows”, he added, these lands “ultimately ended up as part of Soviet Ukrainian, and then as part of independent Ukraine”.
Russia has occupied parts of Ukraine since illegally annexing Crimea in 2014, and holds large swathes of the east.
Donald Trump has said “land-swapping” will be key to any potential settlement. 
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