After Trump’s third phone call with Putin since his inauguration, it appears there will be no let- up in fighting and less U.S. pressure on Moscow.
By Robyn Dixon, Ellen Francis, Anthony Faiola and Isobel Koshiw
May 20, 2025
The Washington Post
After a phone call in which President Donald Trump did not require Russia to stop attacking Ukraine as a condition for peace negotiations, the Kremlin predicted Tuesday that the process would be long and difficult, suggesting Moscow will keep fighting until Kyiv accepts its terms.
Despite Trump’s exhortations for months that the fighting must stop immediately, in the course of Monday’s phone call, Russian President Vladimir Putin managed to add a new delaying element to the process: the need for each side to draft a “memorandum” on the terms of a future peace treaty. “There is no time frame and can be none,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told journalists Tuesday, after Russia once more succeeded in deflecting pressure for an unconditional ceasefire before peace talks — originally a U.S. proposal that was dropped by Trump and taken up by European leaders.
Peskov added that this would be difficult and take time. “The devil is in the details. Drafts will be drawn up both by the Russian side and the Ukrainian side. They will exchange these draft documents, and then there will be difficult contacts to formulate a single text.”
After Trump’s third phone call with Putin since his inauguration, a pattern has emerged: U.S. demands on Putin to show that he is serious about peace, countered by the Kremlin insisting that the complexity of a broader peace deal prevents an immediate ceasefire.
Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov said Monday that Trump and Putin did not discuss a deadline for a ceasefire, although he added that Trump said it should come as soon as possible.
Russia has laid down a series of harsh conditions for any ceasefire, including that Ukraine be barred from any military recruiting or Western weapons assistance — which is unacceptable to Kyiv because it would enable Moscow to unilaterally rearm in preparation for a new attack.
Since the 2022 invasion, Russia’s goal of subjugating Ukraine has not changed, and Moscow has not indicated a willingness to compromise on its hard-line demands that Ukraine give up more territory, never join NATO and drastically reduce the size of its military.
In Kyiv, the phone call dampened hopes that the United States might ally with Europe and force Russia into a ceasefire after Trump said he would not strengthen sanctions on Russia. Ukraine and Europe need the U.S. to join the new sanctions package for it to be effective.
Ukrainian presidential aide Mykhailo Podolyak said that the call “unfortunately did not change the status quo.” He said that Europe and Ukraine want an immediate ceasefire, but that the U.S. still believes Russia will agree to one for the sake of its own business interests.
Podolyak maintained that Russia wants to continue the war because it “is the only way for its current state to exist.”
On Tuesday, Peskov repeated the long-standing Russian position that the conflict be settled by “eliminating the root causes,” language that effectively means the dismantling of Ukrainian sovereignty and installation of a pro-Russian regime.
Trump’s indication that Russia and Ukraine would be left to negotiate a ceasefire between themselves also suggested diminished or minimal U.S. engagement in the process, raising doubts on whether a deal can be reached before the year’s end. Putin is widely seen as being convinced that Russia has the upper hand in the war and can gain more territory over the summer fighting season.
Following a subsequent call between Trump and European leaders, there was the distinct impression that Trump may not be willing to raise pressure on Putin any time soon and could even be ready to scale back U.S. involvement in mediation, said a person familiar with the matter, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive diplomacy.
Just a week ago, European leaders were threatening Russia with major E.U. and U.S. sanctions if it didn’t accept an immediate ceasefire. But the threats from European leaders appeared more guarded after Monday’s phone call, even as they expressed frustration with Putin’s moves. “Vladimir Putin is obviously continuing to play for time,” German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius said Tuesday at a European Union meeting. He said even that though Russia “is prepared to talk about a memorandum,” there was still “no sign” of a ceasefire.
Pistorius said Kyiv’s European backers can keep delivering weapons or money “to the best of our ability, and at the same time, of course, we can continue to participate in diplomatic efforts, but what I am convinced the European Union can and must do is tighten the sanctions screw so that it really becomes clear that we will not be prepared to continue tolerating Russia’s actions here without consequences.”
One of the more surprising elements to emerge from the call was talk of the Vatican playing a mediation role in future negotiations. An Italian official, speaking on the condition of anonymity to outline internal discussions, said the topic of deeper Vatican involvement was raised in several meetings between Vice President JD Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni during the Americans’ visit to Rome for Pope Leo XIV’s inauguration Sunday. “The Vatican is seen as an acceptable mediator, and the Americans signaled that they prefer this to another neutral place. That the Vatican gives the sign of a place in Western civilization where peace can be discussed,” the official said.
The Vatican did not respond to a request for comment on Trump and Meloni’s disclosure of Leo’s offer to host ceasefire talks at the Holy See. The offer, however, would not be uncharacteristic. The Vatican has a long tradition of seeking to defuse conflict, mediating talks
between the government and opposition in Venezuela, as well as with the United States and Cuba to pave the way for President Barack Obama’s visit to Havana in 2016.
In contrast to his predecessor’s more conciliatory approach toward Russia, Leo bluntly described Russia’s war as an “imperial invasion” and land grab. During his first days as pope, he has repeatedly mentioned Ukraine and met privately with Zelensky on Sunday. “I carry in my heart the sufferings of the beloved Ukrainian people,” Leo said during his first Sunday blessing in St. Peter’s Square. “May everything possible be done to reach an authentic, just and lasting peace, as soon as possible. Let all the prisoners be freed and the children return to their own families.”
In Russia, the main reaction to the call was a sense that Trump was moving the U.S. closer to Russia and seeing it as one of its most important trading partners. “The presidents talked in much detail about the future of our relations in their conversation, with President Trump having spoken quite emotionally about the prospects of these relations. He repeatedly emphasized that he favored mutually respectful and mutually beneficial relations with Russia, given its role in the world and its economic position,” Ushakov said.
Konstantin Kosachev, chairman of the foreign affairs committee of Russia’s Federation Council, the upper legislative chamber, said Russia and the United States had emerged as negotiation partners against Europe and Ukraine. “Based on the results of the conversation between Putin and Trump, there is a feeling that two consultative and negotiating groups have finally, but not irrevocably, formed: Russian-American and Ukrainian-European. The first is discussing the prospects for achieving peace, the second — the possibility of continuing the war,” he wrote on social media.
Robyn Dixon is a foreign correspondent on her third stint in Russia, after almost a decade reporting there beginning in the early 1990s. In November 2019 she joined The Washington Post as Moscow bureau chief. She began working in journalism as a copy girl in her hometown afternoon newspaper, the Herald in Melbourne, Australia, in 1978. In 1993 she became Moscow bureau chief for the Sydney Morning Herald and the Age, covering the former Soviet Union and the war in Chechnya. In 1999 she joined the Los Angeles Times as Moscow correspondent and covered conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq. She became Johannesburg bureau chief for the Times in 2003 and spent 15 years covering sub-Saharan Africa before being deployed as the Times’s Beijing bureau chief in 2018.
Ellen Francis is The Washington Post’s Brussels bureau chief, covering the European Union and NATO. She was part of the team that launched The Post’s breaking news hub in London. She was previously at Reuters, as deputy bureau chief in Beirut and as a correspondent covering the war in Syria. Languages spoken in addition to English: Arabic, French. Education: Columbia University, MS in Journalism; American University of Beirut, BE in Civil Engineering.
Anthony Faiola is Rome Bureau Chief for The Washington Post. Since joining the paper in 1994, he has served as bureau chief in Miami, Berlin, London, Tokyo, Buenos Aires and New York and additionally worked as roving correspondent at large.