Source : INDIA TODAY NEWS
US President Donald Trump will meet Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Syrian President Ahmad al-Sharaa on Wednesday during the NATO summit in Turkey, the White House said. The meetings come as Kyiv tries to bring Trump’s focus back to the war with Russia and as Trump has publicly spoken about Syria’s role in the Middle East.
White House spokesperson Anna Kelly said Trump will also meet Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Tuesday in Ankara. Before returning to the United States on Wednesday, he is scheduled to hold a news conference. A senior US official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Trump feels a sense of urgency about ending the war in Ukraine, will discuss that with Zelenskyy, and is expected to follow up with Russian President Vladimir Putin after their meeting.
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Trump’s meeting with Zelenskyy comes in the fifth year of Russia’s war in Ukraine. Zelenskyy and Putin both spoke to Trump by phone on Saturday and congratulated him on the July Fourth commemoration of the 250th anniversary of American independence.
Zelenskyy said in a statement on X that he and Trump discussed the situation on the front lines, where analysts say Russian advances have slowed. Ukraine has also stepped up its attacks on Moscow and shown it can strike deeper inside Russia. Zelenskyy said there is “a real prospect of ending this war” and that the conversation would continue at the NATO summit in Ankara.
Kremlin foreign affairs adviser Yuri Ushakov said Putin told Trump he reaffirmed his “readiness to help achieve a quick cessation of hostilities and search for peaceful solutions to settle the crisis” in Ukraine.
US officials did not give details about the aims of Trump’s meeting with al-Sharaa. As Trump has grown frustrated with Israel’s war with Hezbollah in Lebanon, which has complicated negotiations in the Iran war, he has repeatedly suggested that Syria should instead fight Hezbollah. Al-Sharaa, who led an Islamic insurgent group whose forces ousted Bashar Assad as Syria’s president, has said he has no interest in doing so and has suggested Trump’s comments were misconstrued, even as Trump has repeated them.
In all, Trump’s Ankara visit will include meetings with Zelenskyy, al-Sharaa and Erdogan, with the war in Ukraine and wider tensions in the Middle East set to be at the centre of the discussions.
With PTI Inputs
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SOURCE :- TIMES OF INDIA
