Sawt Falasteen - Trump, Putin set for critical Ukraine talks

Trump said at the weekend that Moscow and Washington are talking about "dividing up certain assets," amid concerns in Kyiv and European capitals that the 78-year-old Republican will cede too much ground to the Kremlin.

A ceasefire is still far from guaranteed though. Kyiv has agreed to halt fighting for 30 days and enter talks with Russia more than three years into Moscow's invasion, but Putin has set a string of conditions.

Trump said on his Truth Social network late Monday that "many elements of a final agreement have been agreed to, but much remains" to be settled.

The talks were "getting down to a very critical stage," Trump added.

Putin gave a hardline anti-Western speech Tuesday before the call, saying the West would still try to undermine Russia even if it lifted sanctions imposed over its invasion of Ukraine.

He mocked the G7 to wild applause from the audience, saying it was too small to "see on a map." And he was still talking at 1300 GMT, the time when the Kremlin had earlier said the call with Trump was supposed to start.

- 'Wants peace' -

Kyiv said it expected Moscow to "unconditionally" accept to the ceasefire.

"It is time for Russia to show whether it really wants peace," Ukraine's Foreign Minister Andriy Sybiga said.

Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky has warned Putin does not want peace and is trying to achieve a better position militarily ahead of any halt in fighting.

Russia has attacked Ukraine with near daily barrages of drones and missiles for more than three years, occupying swathes of southern and eastern Ukraine and pressing a grinding advance in recent months.

Putin has said that a ceasefire only benefits Kyiv and not the Russian army, that he said was "advancing".

Moscow has also made clear that it would not accept NATO troops deployed as peacekeeping forces in Ukraine and has said it was against the US arming Ukraine -- demands that he could put forward to Trump.

The push towards a ceasefire began in February when Trump, who has repeatedly expressed admiration for Putin in the past, completely upended the US policy of unqualified support for Ukraine.

The US president stunned the world when he announced last month that he had spoken to Putin, in a call that broke Western efforts to isolate the Russian leader as long as his forces keep up their Ukraine invasion.

Trump then had a televised shouting match with Zelensky in the Oval Office on February 28 which led to the United States temporarily suspending its billions of dollars in military aid to Kyiv.

White House Deputy Press Secretary Harrison Fields told News Nation TV on Tuesday that "President Putin has a respect for President Trump."

- 'End NOW' -

On Sunday Trump said he would discuss issues of "land" and "power plants" with Putin -- a likely reference to the Moscow-occupied Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant, Europe's largest that fell to Russia in the first days of its invasion.

Zelensky said over the weekend that any discussions over territory should take place at the negotiating table only after a ceasefire.

Trump is intent on delivering on an election pledge to end fighting in Ukraine, blaming his predecessor Joe Biden's policy on Russia for fueling the war.

"It must end NOW," he said on Truth Social.

As Washington and Moscow prepared for the talks, authorities in Russia's Kursk region were evacuating several hundred civilians from areas retaken from Ukraine.

The Kremlin has hailed Moscow's quick offensive there last week as a major success, with Putin calling for Ukrainian soldiers to surrender or be killed.

Russian pensioner Olga Shkuratova's husband was killed last week during fighting as Russia ousted Ukrainian troops from her village of Goncharovka.

"A shell hit. Everything was blown apart in a second. No house, no garage, no barn," the 62-year-old told AFP as she was taken to safety by volunteers.

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