Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and US President Donald Trump met inside St Peter’s Basilica ahead of Pope Francis’ funeral.
The White House described the 15-minute meeting as “very productive” and a Ukrainian spokesperson confirmed the pair would meet for a second time later on Saturday.
Trump and Zelensky were pictured locked in deep discussion, minutes before the funeral ceremony began. Zelensky said the meeting “has potential to become historic, if we achieve joint results”.
He added, “Hoping for results on everything we covered. Protecting lives of our people. Full and unconditional ceasefire. Reliable and lasting peace that will prevent another war from breaking out.” Zelensky ended his post on X by thanking the US president.
The meeting followed Trump’s remarks on Friday that Russia and Ukraine were “very close to a deal”, after talks between his envoy Steve Witkoff and Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow.
Posting an image of Zelensky sitting with Trump, the Ukrainian leader’s head of office, Andriy Yermak, added a single word: “constructive”.
The two leaders had not met since their tempestuous Oval Office encounter at the end of February, when Trump told Zelensky he was not winning and “you don’t have the cards”. He repeated that message this week, saying the Ukrainian leader had “no cards to play”.
Photographs showed Trump in a blue suit and Zelensky wearing a black top and trousers, seated opposite one another in intense conversation. Another image shared by the Ukrainian delegation depicted the two men standing alongside Sir Keir Starmer and France’s Emmanuel Macron, with Macron’s hand on Zelensky’s shoulder, suggesting their role in facilitating the meeting.
Steven Cheung, White House communications director, said more details about the Vatican City private meeting would follow.
After the meeting, Trump and Zelensky walked down the basilica steps and took their seats in the same row. During the service, they sat a short distance apart, with Macron and other heads of state seated between them.
In his homily, Cardinal Giovanni Battista Re recalled Pope Francis’s message: “‘Build bridges, not walls’ was an exhortation he repeated many times,” the cardinal said.
Meanwhile, Trump’s envoy Witkoff departed Moscow on Friday following a fourth visit this year, after three-hour talks described as “very useful” by Putin aide Yuri Ushakov. Ushakov noted the discussions had “brought the Russian and US positions closer together, not just on Ukraine but also on a range of other international issues”, with particular focus on the “possibility of resuming direct talks between Russian and Ukrainian representatives”.
Saturday’s meetings marked the first face-to-face encounter between Trump and Zelensky since February’s unprecedented confrontation in the Oval Office.
During that heated exchange, Trump accused Zelensky of “gambling with World War Three” by resisting Washington-led ceasefire initiatives.
Kyiv has faced increasing pressure from Trump to accept territorial concessions, reportedly including the Crimean peninsula, which Russia illegally annexed in 2014.
Zelensky has consistently rejected such ideas but suggested on Friday to the BBC that “a full and unconditional ceasefire opens up the possibility to discuss everything”.
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