Starmer and Zelensky to meet Trump

Sir Keir Starmer will join Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky and European leaders for a meeting with United States President Donald Trump at the White House today, Downing Street said yesterday.

- DAVID LYNCH

The Prime Minister and a host of European leaders will travel to Washington DC in a show of solidarity with the Ukrainian leader, whose last visit to the Oval Office ended in a tumultuous spat with Mr Trump.

The US president is said to be mulling over Russia's demands to bring an end to the war, which include a land grab of two occupied Ukrainian provinces, Donetsk and Luhansk. Mr Trump is reportedly planning to urge his Ukrainian counterpart to agree to the conditions as part of a peace deal to end the war.

The meeting follows the US president's summit with Russia's President Vladimir Putin in Alaska last Friday, when little in the way of progress appeared to be made.

In the summit’s aftermath, Mr Trump appeared to adopt a change of tone in his language about brokering a peace deal, moving away from insisting that a ceasefire is needed before a long-term agreement to end the war is made. That appeared to echo Mr Putin's refusal to lay down arms ahead of a sustained peace.